Minimum Height Requirement
by Drag0nst0rm
Summary: Bruce's kids want to fight crime. Bruce just wants them to live to adulthood. In this universe, Bruce wins. Mostly.
1. Dick

**A/N: I don't own Batman.**

* * *

Bruce had wanted to spend the night hunting down Zucco. He couldn't get the image of the tiny black haired boy who'd just watched his parents die out of his head. He remembered all too well the helplessness of that moment. He hadn't been able to save Dick's parents, but maybe he could at least get him justice.

He'd _wanted_ to spend the night hunting down Zucco. Unfortunately, he ran into someone else first.

Someone wearing a Flying Grayson circus uniform with a carefully cut out letter "R" safety pinned to the chest and an all too obviously handmade felt mask around his eyes.

"Dick," he said in flat disbelief.

The boy skittered backwards, and - they were on the roof. They were on a roof five blocks from the orphanage. How had Dick gotten here? "N-nope. Not me. Not sure who you're looking for, but - "

He reached out and grabbed the boy's arm. " _Dick_. What are you doing out here?"

The boy's shoulders caved. "I"m looking for Zucco."

"You're going back to bed."

Dick's head snapped up stubbornly. "He killed my parents!"

"I know. I'm taking care of it. Go back to bed."

"I need to bring him to justice!"

"You're _nine._ "

"I could be useful!"

"No."

"Please?"

 _"No."_

That was pretty much how things went for the next three nights.

* * *

Batman loomed over the small boy. "The more time I have to spend tracking you down, the less time I can spend tracking Zucco."

Dick perched on the edge of the building, plainly unimpressed by the loom. "So stop chasing me then."

"No. And get down from there."

"I'll just keep doing this until you let me come."

"Then Zucco will never be caught."

Dick slumped. He pointed to the "R" on his chest. "You know what this is for?"

"No."

"It stands for Robin. That was my mom's name for me. Only she's never going to call me that again, because she's dead. Zucco killed her. If it was your parents, wouldn't you want to be there?"

"I did want to go after my parents' killer," he confessed after a long moment. "But I waited until I was an adult." He placed an awkward hand on the boy's shoulder. "Go home. I'll come tell you when I've got Zucco."

"Don't got a home," the boy muttered. "But okay."

A germ of an idea grew in Bruce's mind.

* * *

Zucco went down. Bruce took Dick in.

Both of those were good things.

Dick finding the Batcave . . . not so much.

"You're Batman!" Dick crowed. "I knew it! I knew it! Why else would you take me in? Can I be your sidekick?"

Bruce didn't even have to think about that one. "No."

"I'd be a great sidekick! I can do all sorts of cool stuff! Look - "

After three weeks of watching Dick do death defying stunts all around the manor, Bruce didn't really need the demonstration, but he got the point. "Impressive. Still no."

"You could teach me how to fight better first," Dick conceded.

Bruce paused. "I probably should do that," he admitted. "You need to know how to defend yourself."

"Asterous! So - "

"Still no."

"But _why?_ " Dick whined.

Bruce sighed and knelt down so that he could look Dick in the eyes. "Because I'm trying to keep kids like you safe in this city, not drag them into battle. I don't want you getting caught up in all this so young."

Dick's eyes gleamed. "And when I'm older?"

"When you're eighteen, you can do what you want. Until then, no capes." His tone was final.

Or, well. As final as things ever got with Dick, anyway.

* * *

"Flash has a sidekick now. So does Green Arrow."

A raised eyebrow. "And?"

"They're okay. I'd be okay too."

Kid Flash had been kidnapped just last week. Roy Harper had gotten shot on the rescue mission and had gotten a wound the doctors said would scar.

"You train the Teen Titians," Dick continued relentlessly. "You work with them. Why not me?"

Yes, he trained them. Relentlessly. Savagely. Determined that if he couldn't talk their mentors into doing the right thing and forcing their kids out of their capes, then he could at least do his best to keep the kids alive.

"Come down to the Cave after I get back from patrol for a week or two," Bruce finally said. "You'll see why."

Dick's eyes widened. "You're letting me into the Cave?"

"Don't make me regret it."

He was absolutely going to regret this.

* * *

The first few nights were totally asterous. Alfred let him listen to Bruce's comm for a couple of hours, and Dick got to help arrange the medical supplies, just in case. Plus he got to stay up way past his bedtime.

And okay, he was a little tired at school afterwards, but if Bruce could manage it every day, then so could he. This was Gotham on the line. This was _Bruce_ on the line. Bruce went out every night, all alone. What if something happened to him? Dick couldn't let that happen.

The fourth night was where it all went wrong.

There was an Arkham breakout. The minute the news went down, Alfred took the comm from him and gripped the chair's arms with white knuckled hands. Dick hurried to get the bandages out.

And Bruce needed them. When he finally got back, he stumbled out of the Batmobile dripping blood. Under the cowl, his face was littered with bruises.

Dick followed Alfred's instructions in white faced silence.

When the last of the wounds were bandaged, Alfred began to tidy up the bloodied workspace. "Perhaps it is time for you to go to bed, Master Dick," he suggested quietly.

Bruce's eyes, closed for the last few minutes, shot open. "No. Not yet." He grabbed Dick's wrist. "This is why," he said intently.

For a moment, Dick's mind was still stuck in the shocked blankness it had been in for most of the night, but reason slowly trickled in. "You think I'll get hurt." Looking down at Bruce, he had to admit that it wasn't farfetched.

Bruce nodded, wincing at the pain, but took the point a step further. "What would your teachers think if you came into class with bruises like this?" He didn't wait for an answer. "They'd think I was abusing you. And if I let you out at night to fight criminals, they'd be right."

"Okay," Dick said quietly.

Bruce leaned back against the pillow, relief easing the lines on his face.

"But you've let me into the Cave now," Dick continued. "And I can still help from in here."

Dick decided to interpret the moan that followed as one of agreement.

* * *

"So." Dick's voice was carefully neutral. "Batgirl."

Bruce restrained a sigh as he looked down at the newspaper laid not-quite-accusingly on the breakfast table.

"She's helping," Dick continued, voice still carefully flat.

"You're helping," Bruce said automatically. He had a line of stitches in his arm that could speak for that.

"She's fighting," Dick countered. "With you."

"She interfered in the fight," Bruce corrected. "After which, I tried to talk her into putting up the cape for awhile."

Dick raised an eyebrow. "And?"

"She wouldn't listen," Bruce admitted reluctantly. "So I threatened to tell her father."

"Her father being . . . ?"

"Commissioner Gordon."

Dick choked on his bacon. _"Barbara's_ Batgirl?"

Bruce raised an eyebrow in unspoken question.

Dick . . . blushed. Interesting. "We talked at the police ball," he muttered. "She's - nice."

 _Very_ interesting.

"Well, the threat worked," Bruce said dryly, "so her evenings should be free if you'd like to ask her to dinner sometime."

Dick choked on his bacon again.

* * *

In hindsight, Bruce shouldn't have encouraged them to date. Because they weren't just dating.

They had _joined forces._

"We want to help."

And Bruce just wanted the children he was more or less responsible for to live to adulthood. Was that too much to ask for?

"You are - "

"Dick is," Barbara interrupted. "I want to help too. I'm good with computers. I've hacked into Gotham's security cameras before. I can do it again. That way, we can keep an eye on you, and a lookout for crime to steer you towards."

Bruce wasn't . . . enthusiastic about the idea of the kids getting a good look at some of the more violent crime in Gotham, but he was pretty sure Dick was sneaking looks into his case files anyway, and maybe this would strip some of the glamor from vigilantism. "Fine."

* * *

The year Dick was seventeen was - tense.

Dick stepped up his self-defense practice. Bruce pretended not to notice.

Dick started sketching out what looked suspiciously like costumes. Bruce pretended not to notice.

Dick started studying his case files openly, and Bruce pretended not to notice right up until he caught Dick looking at footage of the Joker's latest atrocity, and at that point he had to step in.

"You want to go out," he said quietly from behind Dick's place at the Cave computer.

Dick jumped, but he didn't let himself get distracted. "Yeah," he said firmly. "I do. You keep getting hurt. We almost lost you last month. You need backup, Bruce. And in two months, per your own words, if I want to go out and do that, you can't stop me."

Bruce let out a long breath. "Barbara?"

"She wants to stay in the Cave and keep running the tech. But she wants to start calling herself Oracle."

Bruce grunted. "Fine."

"Fine to which?" Dick asked cautiously.

"Both."

"Because I remember what you said and - Wait. What?"

"Fine." He stepped back. "We've got two months to go. That's not much time to pack in more training."

Dick beamed.

* * *

His senior year of high school, Robin reappeared on the streets of Gotham. Dick knew he had to be stealthy, but the first time he went out in the costume, he couldn't help but let out a whoop that could be heard for blocks around.

And if Bruce was still a little smothering, well. At least he was finally out here.

* * *

"You want to be a cop."

"A detective," Dick corrected. "I just have to work my way up through the ranks first."

"So you're . . . quitting vigilantism?" Bruce asked with dying, desperate hope.

Dick looked at him blankly. "Why would I do that?"

"Fighting crime at all hours of the night _and_ day," Alfred said dryly as he removed the dinner dishes. "You cannot, at least, fault his dedication to the mission."

"I've got a lot of time to make up for," Dick said brightly. He took one last swig of his drink and bounded up. "Well, I've got to go. I've got an apartment to go look at."

Bruce watched him go with dismay. "Commissioner Gordon's daughter is studying library science. _Commissioner Gordon's_ daughter stays in the Cave. Where did I go wrong?" he moaned.

Alfred patted his shoulder consolingly. "I know what you mean, Master Bruce. I know what you mean."


	2. Jason

In another world, where there had been more vigilantes out sooner, maybe Gotham would have been just that little bit cleaner. In another world, maybe it wouldn't have come to this.

But this wasn't an another world. It was this one, and Jason was just going to have to make the best of it.

The local gangs had a mean streak that they didn't mind aiming at kids. In the old days, Jason would have just run off whenever they started poking around too close to his hiding spot.

That was before he'd somehow collected a passel of kids that were so pathetic he couldn't help feeling just a little bit responsible for them.

If it was just Alli, they could have run anyway. Alli was only about a year younger than him, and she was plenty fast.

But it wasn't just Alli. It was also Alli's tiny baby brother Sam, and Alli couldn't run nearly as fast when she had to carry him. It was also Sarah, who was so small her tiny legs couldn't carry her very fast at all, and whose breaths came in desperate little huffs whenever she tried. It was Steve, whose left leg was all twisted up and who couldn't really run at all.

They still ran, mind. There was no way they could fight off the kind of gangs that roamed Crime Alley. But if running was going to do any good, they had to buy some time to get to better hidey holes.

That was where Jason came in.

The whole idea started when he caught a glimpse of Robin flying through the night and not two days later found a pair of pants in precisely Robin's shade of green and that were almost Jason's size in the church charity bin.

The pants weren't quite like Robin's, of course. The donated pants were loose sweatpants, not the armored whatever that Robin were.

But the color was perfect.

That was when the idea really started to bloom.

He couldn't find a plain red t-shirt in the bin, so he just picked one that's slogan didn't show much when he turned it inside out. The yellow "R" wasn't too hard either. Alli - who thought he was crazy but was helping anyway - managed to scavenge up an almost empty tube of paint that they dabbed onto their fingers and used to paint the letter onto the t-shirt until it almost glowed in the dark. The domino mask was even easier. He just found the edge of a trash bag that looked mostly clean and cut it off with a jagged piece of glass. He used the ragged edges to tie it around his head, and he tore holes in for the eyes.

The hard part was the cape.

Capes were not a typical donation to any charity bin or discount store he was aware of. If the cape had been black like Batman's, he could have just used another trash bag, but Robin, for reasons best known to himself, had a yellow cape brighter than a traffic light.

He wouldn't bother with the gloves and boots. Those were small enough things, and he wasn't trying to fool anyone who was giving a good long look. He was too small for that anyway. He just wanted a half-second of surprise and hesitation that would give him a chance to get one good hit in and then take off so he could distract whoever was messing with them.

And for that, he needed that bright, blinding, sunshine stealing cape.

That was when Alli came back to their refrigerator box with an ankle length butter yellow skirt over her arm.

Jason looked up from counting the money Sarah and Steve had managed to scrounge up that day. He frowned when he saw the skirt. "You sure, Alli? It looks kinda hard to run in." Sam burbled in what Jason chose to take as agreement.

Alli rolled her eyes. "It's not for me. It's for you."

Jason blinked. "Um. I'm not sure it's really my style."

Alli laid the skirt out on the ground and looked over the flowing material with a critical eye. "It is if you want a cape. Pass me a knife."

* * *

The costume, Jason freely admitted, was terrible. By the light of day, by the light of a good _streetlight,_ the only reaction he was ever going to get was hysterical laughter.

But he wasn't using it during the day, and this was Gotham. It wasn't hard to avoid good streetlights.

All he really needed were those trademark colors. When the thugs got a glimpse of that red, yellow, and green, they took an instinctive step back, eyes flicking to the shadows like they were checking for Batman.

And while they were hesitating, the little ones were running, and Jason was getting in his one good hit and then fleeing in the opposite direction.

And it worked. It really worked.

Right up until it didn't.

* * *

News of the mouthy little kids and their stupid tricks spread, and people had gotten their pride hurt by getting hit by a twelve year old and not getting a hit in back.

There were more of them this time. Both ends of the alley and the fire escape, blocking off their escape routes. More of them, and they were ready for his trick.

"Come out, come out, little Robin," one of them called mockingly. "Come out, come out, and play!"

The gauzy yellow cape felt abruptly choking around his neck. He fumbled for the tire iron he'd been using to jack tires for the past few weeks. His hands were slick with sweat.

He was dead. He was so dead.

"Stay here," he breathed.

They were - they were looking for him. They were looking for the kid who was pretending to be Robin. Maybe - maybe they wouldn't look too hard for the others.

He shoved Sarah backwards, further into the piles of cardboard and layers of shadow. Terrified tears streaked silently down her face, and she clutched at Steve's arm when it looked like he'd follow after Jason.

Alli glared at him furiously, but Sam was asleep in her arms, and if he woke up and started wailing, there'd be no hiding for anyone.

Jason burst from the cardboard and swung the tire iron at the back of the first thug he saw.

The thug stumbled a step, cursing. The others circled in closer.

All around him. Nowhere to run.

He bounced a bit on the balls of his feet, iron ready, just waiting for one of them to come in close enough for him to reach -

The hairs on the back of his neck prickled, and he spun around, iron already swinging.

It hit a man hard in the stomach. Said man didn't move an inch.

Jason wasn't really surprised, seeing as the man was Batman.

He gulped and took a step backward.

Bad knock-off of his sidekick's costume, hitting the man with a tire iron . . . On the plus side, there was no way those thugs weren't going home with bruises tonight.

On the downside, he was pretty sure he wasn't either.

Two of the thugs, the smart ones, took off running. Something brightly colored unfolded from the shadows and dropped down in front of them.

"Hello, there! Heard you were looking for me."

The first blows landed before the thugs could blink.

Robin.

Yep. He was dead.

But right now, Batman was taking on two, and Robin had two, which meant there was still one thug left, so Jason used the confusion to his advantage, ducking around Batman's cape to hit the thug hard in the knee. The thug's fist crashed into his jaw, but Jason just kept hitting. There was blood streaming down his face, but he heard something crack in the other man's knee, and he sprang back as the thug fell to the ground.

Apparently, Batman and Robin had taken care of their own opponents, because when he turned around, they were right there, staring at him.

Robin was the one to break the silence.

"You've gotta admit, he did a good job on the costume."

Jason stared at him incredulously. Batman pinched the bridge of his nose and otherwise ignored the statement. He directed his next words to Jason.

"You need to come with us."

Jason skittered back a step.

Robin raised his hands placatingly. "We just want to - "

"No!"

Alli flung herself out of the cardboard shelter and landed in front of Jason, hissing like a feral cat protecting a kitten. She must have given Sam to Sarah, and judging by the wailing, he had indeed woken up and protested the arrangement.

Steve used the distraction to barrel into Batman's knee. He pretty much just bounced off, but the distraction would have been a good chance to get away if Jason hadn't been just as startled as the Bat.

Steve wasn't one to be much deterred by things like that, so he kept hammering at the Bat's knee with his tiny fists, lungs already huffing from the exertion.

Jason couldn't exactly see much of Batman's face, and he couldn't read what he did. Robin, apparently, could.

"B . . . "

And Jason wasn't sure exactly what that tone meant either, but he _did_ know that it prompted Batman to lean down and pick up the kid, not even seeming to notice the fists now hammering at his chest. "Correction," Batman said. "You're all coming with us."

And since he was still holding Steve, Jason guessed they were.

* * *

The Batmobile was both the coolest and the scariest thing Jason had ever touched in his life.

Also, it had _awesome_ tires. Those would have set them up for a _month._

Now he was mainly hoping they weren't all about to get murdered.

"Look," he tried once they were all crammed into the backseat, and he finally managed to get his tongue back. "The costume was my stupid idea. Don't be mad at the others."

Robin twisted around to look at him. "We're not mad," he said soothingly. "Just concerned."

"I'll stop wearing the costume," Jason offered.

"Why did you put it on in the first place?" Batman asked.

"I had to do _something_ to keep us all breathing. The cape worked. Sort of."

Batman grunted. Robin nodded.

Jason shot a nervous look at Alli and hoped that if that had been a test, then their reactions meant he'd passed.

* * *

Bruce remembered the first time he'd talked to Dick. He'd seen himself in that wide eyed, terrible blankness that came from watching your parents die. He'd seen himself even more strongly when the boy had decided to handle it by dressing up and going out to hunt for their murderer.

He'd seen himself and it had terrified him. Dick shouldn't have to grow up like him.

He'd seen himself in Jason too as soon as he'd seen that resignation chased away by defiance. The boy had been surrounded by enemies he had no hope of defeating and had fought anyway. Because he'd seen the evil around him and had to do _something._

Bruce fought alongside the Justice League. He knew that feeling of suspecting you were outmatched beyond all hope and fighting anyway. Of fighting against crime and evil and corruption in endless waves because you had to do _something._

And now there five children in the Batcave because he'd seen the existence they'd been scraping out in Crime Alley, and Bruce had made a career out of answering, S _omeone should do something_ with _Consider it done._

Dick kept the kids entertained while Bruce ran blood samples and the information he'd coaxed out of the kids.

Allison and Samuel Scott. Their maternal grandparents were still alive and fairly affluent, he found. The mother had been a teenage runaway. When their parents had died, the children would have had no way to contact their grandparents.

The grandparents might not be willing to take the children in, but judging by the aging couple's continuing efforts to get word of their lost daughter, Bruce thought there was a decent chance.

Steve, it turned out, had a multitude of relatives. That wasn't the problem. The problem was that there was only one aunt willing to take him, and piecing together what the boy had said and what could he see by looking through the records Oracle had sent over, he guessed that the boy had run away after overhearing concerns about the mounting medical bills.

Well, he could fix that easily enough.

Sarah was a trickier case, but he knew from Gordon that there was an officer, a good man, who was looking to adopt a little girl. It would be easy enough to pull a few strings and make it happen.

Which just left Jason Todd. Father dead, adopted mother dead, biological mother out of the picture. And Jason didn't have good odds of getting adopted.

Young. Angry. Desperate to act.

Bruce knew something about that.

* * *

Jason had been prepared for a lot of possibilities when they'd been dragged back to the cave.

Adoption hadn't been one of them.

Even now, with the paperwork sorted mysteriously fast, he was still trying to wrap his head around it.

Child services, sure. He'd been more than prepared for the idea that Batman might try to dump them somewhere. The idea that he'd take the time to make sure that those places were actually worth staying at, places that were letting them call each other as often as they wanted and see each other nearly as often, places they weren't quite ready to run away from - well, that was a different matter.

And he really hadn't expected Batman to leave him with _Bruce Wayne_ of all people.

It was a nice place, Jason had to admit. A room bigger than some apartments he'd been in, more food than he could eat, and a chance to go to school again.

So good, there had to be a catch.

And then at breakfast, only a week after he was settled into the manor, he finally figured it out. Or started to, at least.

Dick was there for a visit, his second since Jason's arrival, and he was busy digging into a stack of Alfred's pancakes.

That wasn't the catch. If Dick wanted to come over twice a week to eat Alfred's cooking, Jason wasn't gong to judge.

The catch was that there was a dark splotch on the back of Dick's t-shirt, and it was steadily growing.

Jason froze in the doorway.

"Hey, Jay!" Dick said through a mouthful of pancakes. "Come take a seat." He waved his fork at the seat opposite him.

Jason moved on automatic. "What happened to your back?" The words came out a bit strange.

Dick's mouth twisted. "Ah, man, I knew I popped those stitches again. I'll have to get Alfred to patch me up. It's nothing too bad, though," he hastened to add. "Just another day in the Gotham PD."

Jason nodded like he accepted this and reached for some of the food.

But Jason knew Dick had only been a police officer for about a year, and he hadn't lived at the manor for most of that.

So why did he automatically think of Alfred when it came to redoing stitches?

* * *

Alli told him to leave it alone and be careful.

Jason walked carefully around Bruce for the next few days in keeping with the second piece of advice, and he might have followed the first one.

Bruce was a big man, and he had far more muscles than the tabloid pictures would have led Jason to expect. Jason wasn't blind to the hint of an argument that kept popping up at the edges of Bruce and Dick's interactions. He didn't need anyone to spell it out for him.

He was pretty sure he had it figured it out.

Right up until he came down for breakfast and it wasn't _Dick_ that had a black eye that was almost but not quite concealed by makeup.

And that - that didn't compute. At which point Alli's advice got tossed out the window.

Unless - Unless Dick had gotten tired of it and snapped? Dick was on his own now. He was independent. He was a pretty athletic guy himself. He could have done it.

But Jason hadn't thought they had been that near of a blow-up, and his skills weren't so rusty that he would have missed that.

Plus, Bruce seemed cheerful enough. Jason thought he might actually be _humming_ as he read the morning paper. Something about Batman catching the Joker again screamed across the headlines.

Good for him. Jason was starting to wish Batman would show up the manor because there was definitely something up, and it was starting to make him edgy. How was he supposed to keep himself safe if he didn't know who to be wary of?

Bruce looked up from the paper and gave him the blinding smile Jason had seen from tabloid covers for years. "Jay-lad! How are you?"

"Fine," Jason said warily, edging towards the table. His instincts were prodding him to get out, but - Alfred's cooking. He grabbed a piece of toast and forced himself to sit down. He eyed Bruce for a minute to make sure he was really in a good mood before trying out a quick probe. "How are _you?"_

"I'm fine," Bruce assured him. "Why wouldn't I be?"

Jason didn't quite dare call him on it. He just gave a nod, and, as soon as Bruce's attention was back on the paper, grabbed a piece of toast and dodged out of the room.

* * *

A quick and cautious call to Dick confirmed that Dick and Bruce's argument, whatever it was, hadn't escalated. Jason thought it might have something to do with Dick joining the police force. He'd caught the words "unnecessary risks" and "overprotective" more than once.

Unless that wasn't about police work at all. Unless it was about whatever was leaving them both bruised and bleeding.

Because it kept happening. Bruce winced when he had lean over to pick up his briefcase. Dick had a bandage poking out from under his sleeve. Bruce showed up at breakfast with lingering signs of a concussion. Dick stiffened when Jason poked him in the ribs in vengeance for one of Dick's octopus hugs.

Between the fights Jason kept getting into at the fancy school Bruce insisted on sending him to and whatever was going on with Dick and Bruce, Alfred was the only one in the household that wasn't trying to hide some sort of bruise.

. . . And that was terrifying in its own right for a couple of minutes as Jason wondered, _Maybe -_

Then Alfred showed up, asked what was troubling him, and when Jason stuttered out some nonsense answer just nodded wisely and asked if Master Jason would like to assist in the baking of some chocolate chip cookies.

Okay. Alfred wasn't the problem here.

The thing was, Jason couldn't imagine who was. Bruce Wayne was a billionaire who was built like a small mountain. He was pretty much the antithesis of the word vulnerable, and Dick was no pushover. What could possibly be happening?

Jason saw the explanations the tabloids put out whenever the media caught wind of whatever Jason had long since noticed. Except their explanation was always, "a polo accident, a skydiving accident, a car crash," and Jason might have been fooled, except he knew where Bruce had been on those days, and it hadn't been doing any of that.

Besides. They were always fine when he saw them during the day, or at least no worse than they'd been that morning. It was only after they went their separate ways for the night that something went wrong.

Maybe he should try and track down Batman and Robin. They must have some sort of connection with Bruce Wayne to leave him here.

Batman. Robin. Nighttime. Billionaires that were built like small mountains and annoying sort-of brothers that moved like acrobats. Weird injuries.

Oh.

* * *

"So at what point do you start training me to be your sidekick?"

Bruce did his best not to choke on the piece of steak he'd just put in his mouth. Dick spluttered into his glass.

Jason's eyes darted between them. "I am going to get training, right? You're not just going to throw me out there? 'Cause I mean, I'm good, but I don't know if I'm quite _Killer Croc good_ yet, you know?"

Bruce put his fork down carefully. "Jason," he said slowly. "What exactly are you talking about?"

"I'm not an idiot," Jason said dismissively. "I pieced all those bruises together and they painted a pretty clear picture. So, first test passed." He frowned. "Or second test, I guess. The fight might have been the first."

"Bruises. Huh." Dick sounded impressed. That was not the appropriate reaction here. "I didn't figure it out until I found the Batcave."

"Focus," Bruce snapped. "What tests are you talking about, Jay?"

Jason gripped his silverware a little tighter. "That's what's going on, right? It makes sense. Boy Wonder one grows up, you find a bunch of kids no one will miss in Crime Alley, you pick the scrappiest, and boom. You've got a new sidekick in training."

Bruce pinched the bridge of his nose. Dick winced.

"First," Dick said, "I'm a partner, not a sidekick. Second, and this probably should have been first, no. This house has a strict no underage vigilantes policy. Trust me. I tested it for years."

"I took you in to give you a home, Jason," Bruce said, making his voice gentle. "You're under no obligation to follow Dick's footsteps and take up vigilantism when you're older. Or to join the police force. Or to fight crime in any way. Whatever you want to do will be fine."

"In fact, if it's something nonviolent, you'll probably get catapulted to favorite child status," Dick confided. "B can be a wee bit overprotective. Thus the no sidekicks policy." He paused and looked at Jason thoughtfully. "Although twelve does seem a lot younger than I remember it being."

Bruce chose to ignore the faint bitterness of Dick's first statements and focused on Jason. The boy still looked uncertain.

"No fighting?" he checked.

"It might be a good idea to hone your skills a little as a safety precaution," Bruce conceded. No one had ever succeeded at snatching Dick, but some had tried. "But other than that, no. Speaking of which, what's this I hear about a fight at school today?"

Jason blinked at the sudden change in topic. "Oh. Um. They were bullying one of the other kids?"

Bruce sighed. "And you thought punching them was the best way to handle that?"

Jason blinked again. "I really don't think you have a leg to stand on here, Bats."

"There's a reason I fight anonymously. Punching people in the middle of a crowded hallway is not anonymously."

The point might have gone over better if Dick hadn't been falling out of his chair laughing.

* * *

Jason dumped his books down onto the table. "So I was talking to Barbara at the tutoring session today."

"Mm?" Bruce looked from his WE papers. Jason was a bright kid, but he'd missed a lot of school. Barbara was helping him make up the difference.

"She offered to teach me hacking."

And then things like this happened.

"Why," he asked flatly.

Why did he need to know how to hack. Why did he _want_ to know how to hack. Why would Barbara offer. Why were his children like this.

Jason shrugged with exaggerated nonchalance. "She's working on some little automated bats she can send out if you and Dick ever get into trouble. Once she gets them operational, it'd be good if she had an extra set of hands around the place."

"You're too young," Bruce said automatically.

"Too young for the streets," Jason countered with his mouth twisted at the irony of that. "Not too young for the Cave."

"Dick was a year older than you when he started."

"Dick hadn't seen all the stuff I have," Jason said. "Consider my innocence well and truly shattered. I can handle whatever comes up on those screens."

"Just because you can doesn't mean you should have to."

"Maybe." Jason lifted one shoulder in a half shrug. "But if I can help, I want to. And - " He flushed a little red but kept going. "And I wouldn't mind being able to, you know. Check up on you."

To make sure they were safe. Bruce felt himself weakening.

"You'll do exactly what Barbara tells you."

"Yes!" Jason whooped, pumping his fist in the air.

Bruce eyed him dryly. "That had better have been an agreement."

* * *

It had been a slow night on patrol and Dick had a big day tomorrow, so he headed in early.

"Hey, Babs," he said, kissing the top of her head. "How are the computers looking?"

Barbara eyed them critically. "Pretty good. I can probably handle them alone if you want to take Fidget here over to the training mats."

Jason looked up hopefully. "Sparring?"

Dick grinned. "Sure. Getting restless, huh?" He could relate.

"You try sitting at these computers all night," Jason grumbled. "You'd be ready for some action too." He froze. "Er, I mean, sitting at the computers right up until my mandated bedtime and not a second over."

Barbara rolled her eyes. "Nice cover, kiddo." She swiveled around in her chair so she could look at Dick. "Just on the bad nights," she reassured him, "and always with Alfred's okay."

"So you won't tell Bruce, right?" Jason asked hopefully.

"Jaybird, if Bruce doesn't already know, I'm an Arkham inmate." Dick had long experience with this. "Just try not to make too much of a habit of it, okay? You're too young for coffee."

"And to fight. And to drive. And to get on the stupid debate team at school - "

Dick frowned. "Debate won't let you on? You're just a semester under the requirement. Can't they make an exception?" Jason had been really excited about it a few nights ago. Dick had thought it would be good for him. Jason didn't really have any friends except for the gang of kids he'd been rescued with, and he didn't get to see them as often as he liked. And besides, the only reason Jason was a semester behind the requirement was because he'd started the school at a weird time. He was the same age as most of the members.

Jason shrugged like he didn't much care, but Dick could see the curl of disappointment in his shoulders. "I tried to talk the coach into it, but I guess I'm not as ready for the team as I thought."

Dick threw an arm around his shoulders and led him over to the practice mats. "I bet we can figure something out. Hey, Barbara, do you think if you hacked into the coach's email - "

"No."

"But - "

"No."

Dick pouted. "Now you just sound like Bruce."

Jason snickered, though, so at least they'd accomplished something.

* * *

Bruce had known from the beginning that this career was unlikely to end with him dying peacefully in his bed. He'd been terrified of what might happen ever since Dick started joining him out in the night.

He hadn't worried as much about Barbara. Oracle held a protected place in the Cave.

But what happened didn't have anything to do with Oracle. It was only about the fact that she Commissioner Gordon's daughter.

Dick was already in a chair by the hospital bed. His hands were clasped together to keep them from shaking. Bruce went to stand behind him. He squeezed his shoulder before reaching out to Barbara.

"Barbara. How are you doing?"

Her eyes were only half open. The drugs she was on were still pretty strong. "I'm - " Her mouth twisted, and she changed the topic. "Dad?"

"Safe," Bruce promised. Jason finally stopped hovering in the doorway and crept into the room.

"Joker?"

"Batman smashed him," Jason said in a tone that was almost awed. "The news said he almost _died."_

Bruce shifted uncomfortably. But this wasn't about him. He squeezed Barbara's hand. "He won't be bothering anyone for a long time."

"Good," she breathed. Her eyes were drifting shut. "May be - while before I can work."

"I'll take care of it," Jason promised instantly.

"Good," Barbara said again before drifting off again.

Bruce looked down at his elder son. Dick wouldn't be going anywhere for a while, and Bruce didn't want to leave him. His younger son, meanwhile, was still jittery from the coffee he'd snuck in order to stay awake through the whole ordeal.

"Jay, would you go scrounge up a couple more chairs for us?"

"Sure." He was out the door immediately.

Bruce sat beside Dick and squeezed his arm. "She's still here," he reminded him.

"I know," Dick breathed. "I know." His face was tortured. "I just never thought - "

"I know."

Gordon would be here soon. The doctors couldn't hold him back much longer no matter how badly he needed the medical attention. Bruce wouldn't stay long after he came. Bruce Wayne had a right to be concerned about his son's long time girlfriend, but it would be odd if he stayed for too long, and Gordon deserved some privacy.

Besides. Leaving would give him some time to think about how to convince Gordon it was only natural that Bruce get Barbara into the best therapy center he could find.

Maybe he could bribe the insurance company into pretending to cover it?

* * *

Apparently, Jason thought with what was possibly a small hint of hysteria, it was a bad year for civilian identities. Just a few months ago Barbara had been paralyzed.

And now he'd been kidnapped. Not as Oracle's inferior and increasingly unnecessary fill-in, but as Jason Todd-Wayne, adopted son of Bruce Wayne.

He strained at the ropes binding his hands behind the chair again, but there just wasn't any slack to work with, and he'd never been trained on this particular knot.

That was starting to look like a serious oversight in his education.

The thugs weren't even anyone good. Even Jason's father, worthless as he generally was, had managed to get taken out by Two-Face. Jason refused to die at the hands of some no name who just wanted a payout and was willing to kidnap a fifteen year old kid to get it.

If he could move the chair, maybe he could do something, but it was bolted to the floor.

If only he'd fought harder and hadn't gotten grabbed in the first place. There'd only been six guys. Bruce could have totally taken six guys. Dick could have taken six guys. Barbara -

He cut that thought off, although given enough time, Jason was sure Barbara could take out six guys in one go once again.

Jason? Jason got taken out and beaten until he felt bruises throbbing all over his body and the faint taste of copper in his mouth. It had been a long time since he felt like that. Sparring sessions had never gotten this rough. Probably because the others hadn't been willing to _kill him -_

He took a deep breath. He'd be okay. Bruce would pay the money or show up as Batman or convince the police to make the case their number one priority or whatever. He'd be okay.

He hitched in a painful breath and tried to believe it.

* * *

Half a million dollars. That was what they valued his son at. Half a million dollars.

He wanted to pound them into a bloody pulp. He wanted to laugh. He wanted to cry.

That was all they thought his son was worth to him? Half a million dollars?

He had it, of course, and he'd pay it gladly if he thought it would work.

And it might. He didn't know these men. Hadn't fought them before.

And he couldn't find them, couldn't figure them out, couldn't even pay the ransom, because Jason's kidnapping had been all too public, and the police were involved. Involved and all but sitting on him.

It was daylight too, and the Bat wasn't supposed to prowl in the day, but Bruce didn't care. He didn't care if the police finally figured out his secret, he didn't care what the public saw, he just _wanted his son back._

"We'll figure this out," Gordon promised him.

Bruce nodded. It wasn't hard to look a little green. "I'll just - " He nodded towards the hall that led to a bathroom in the manor.

Gordon nodded and turned to find a free officer. To stand outside the door, probably.

It didn't matter. Bruce was already gone.

* * *

For three days, he tore the city apart brick by bloody brick. Dick helped him whenever he could get away from concerned fellow officers. Barbara scoured her networks for a trace.

Nothing.

When the deadline for the money came, he paid it. He was out of other options.

Five minutes after the money was transferred, he got a phone call. He answered it on the first ring. Oracle would already be tracing it.

"Bruce?" Jason's voice shook.

"Jason." Bruce's knees felt weak. He should have paid the money from the beginning. He should have -

Three shots rang out from the other side. They were followed by a choked scream.

"Jason!" The word barely sounded human.

An address was growled into the phone from the other side.

The call ended.

* * *

Oracle was on the comm in his ear. She was telling him something. Warning him about the approaching police.

Bruce didn't care.

Jason had still been tied to the chair. Bruce'd had to cut him loose.

Three bullets had crashed into him. The chair was soaked with blood that dripped down onto the concrete floor.

Too late. He'd been too late, and Jason -

 _Jason._

He heard the sirens dimly. He clung tighter to the body in his arms.

Footsteps clattered down the stairs. "No, keep the others _out_ of here. You've got your orders!"

Gordon.

"Batman?" The footsteps were more cautious now. "I got a call from one of your people, Oracle. Sounded kind of worried - " The commissioner froze.

Batman couldn't do this, Bruce realized dully. For Batman, this was just another senseless tragedy.

If the thugs had still been here, he could have been Batman. But they were gone.

And he couldn't be anything but Jason's father right now.

Gordon was on his radio again. "I'm going to need a few more minutes. Keep Officer Grayson away from the scene. He doesn't need to see this."

Dick. He'd have to tell Dick.

But it was just Commissioner Gordon for now.

Gordon and gunshots. They were back to the beginning now.

Gordon didn't tell him it would be alright this time. Maybe he didn't think he could say something like that to Batman. Maybe he was trying to keep up his end of the pretense that Bruce Wayne and Batman were two separate people. Maybe it was because he was a father and he knew all too well that it wouldn't.

"It would have been fast," he said, comfort disguised as a considered opinion. "He wouldn't have felt anything."

Bruce growled. He didn't think he was capable of anything more coherent at the moment.

He knew gunshot wounds.

This hadn't been fast. This had hurt.

It had hurt, just like the skin rubbed raw and bloody by the ropes had hurt, like the bruises that littered the too small body had hurt, like the bones he could feel shifting and _broken_ had hurt.

It hurt.

Gordon winced and huffed out a breath in acknowledgement. Bruce waited for him to go or to tell Batman he needed to leave.

Instead, he sat down on the bottom stairs and waited quietly in the dark until Bruce could finally force his arms to let go.

* * *

The only reporter at the funeral was Clark, and that was because Bruce needed Clark there and needed an excuse to do it. He owned the _Planet_. It wasn't hard to arrange it.

Dick. Alfred. Barbara. The commissioner. Alli. Sam. Steve. Sarah. Their caregivers.

It felt too small. Too small a crowd for such a vibrant life.

But then everything felt too small. The body in the coffin. The walls around him whenever he went inside. The air he tried to breathe.

One of the shots had hit Jason's left lung.

He hadn't been able to breathe.

* * *

It was Oracle who got him the names of the thugs, and the police who managed to track down who hired them.

An ex-employee of Wayne Enterprises. He'd been accused of stealing funds and subsequently fired.

The amount involved was half a million dollars.

Bruce Wayne nodded and shut the file, and Batman grunted and turned off his comm.

And then he went to work.

* * *

"You should have taken me with you."

"No." No, Bruce had not been about to take his one remaining son to face the men who had taken his younger one.

Dick's fist slammed into the table. "I had the right, Bruce! I loved him too, you know!"

"It's done." There was no point in arguing about it.

Something about the flat tone in his voice caused Dick to freeze. "When you say it's done . . . "

Bruce was silent for a long moment. "The commissioner has them." He had to force the words out.

More accurately, the paramedics had them. But they would live.

As much as he hated the thought, they would live. They just wouldn't enjoy it very much.

* * *

"Master Bruce, you really ought to eat something."

* * *

"B, it's fine. I can handle it."

* * *

"Master Bruce, when was the last time you slept?"

* * *

"Stop trying to protect me! I can take care of myself!"

* * *

"Master Bruce, I really must insist - "

* * *

"I'm fine out there!" Dick snarled as he threw himself out of the Batmobile and into the cave. "I've been trained!"

"So was Jason!" Bruce snapped back, all his worry and fear exploding out of him.

"Not like Robin," Dick snarled. "Robin would have known his way out of that knot!"

The not-quite-accusation hung in the air between them.

"Dick," Barbara said carefully from her place at the computer.

But Dick was on one of the motorcycles and going, going, gone.

* * *

"Master Bruce, it wasn't your fault."

It was entirely his fault.

* * *

"Batman."

"Oracle."

For once, there was a hesitation on the other end of the line. "Be careful out there tonight. Robin won't be there to back you up."

"Where is he?" _Don't let him be hurt, please don't let him be hurt -_

"He's got a thing for his day job," Oracle said, carefully picking around the sensitive information. "In our sister city."

"How long?"

"I don't know." There was a long pause. "It could be . . . awhile."

He swallowed hard. He would have thought that Dick would have stayed for Barbara, at least.

"We're - taking a break. For awhile."

He should have rebuked her for saying something personal on the comm, but -

But right now, it was all he could do to breathe.

* * *

There were rumors of a new superhero in Bludhaven. Nightwing, they called him.

Dick had loved that story as a child.

Bruce kept going and tried to pretend that fighting didn't make it easier to breathe.


	3. Tim

Tim looked at the graph. He checked the parameters. He looked at the graph again.

The facts remained the same. Based on newspaper clippings, news reports, and his own firsthand observations, the degree of violence Batman exhibited had risen dramatically.

He'd been hoping he'd just been imagining it.

In his opinion Batman's recklessness was rising too, but that was more subjective and thus harder to graph.

It wasn't that it was _surprising,_ Tim had to admit. The man's son had only been dead for a few months now, and now that Robin was gone too . . .

He swallowed. He didn't like to think about Robin being - gone.

On a trip to deal with his grief? Recovering from an injury? Kidnapped?

Dead?

Tim didn't know, and all his investigation had been able to turn up was that if anyone had seen Dick Grayson recently, they weren't talking about it.

He couldn't be dead. He couldn't.

Especially not so soon after Jason.

He bit his lip as he carefully tucked the paper away in a folder and then locked the folder in the padlocked box, complete with a rudimentary booby trap, beneath his bed. His parents wouldn't be home for weeks yet, but tomorrow was the maid's cleaning day. He couldn't risk her seeing this.

He couldn't risk letting Batman keep going like this either. Sooner or later he would either cross a line, get seriously hurt, or -

And Gotham needed Batman.

So what did Batman need?

Tim sat back on his heels beside the bed as he considered the question. What did Batman need?

A Robin, possibly, except he hadn't had Robin until Tim was nine, and Tim had been taking pictures for over a year before that. Batman had gotten by without a partner then, and while having a Robin had reined him in a bit after Jason, the danger levels had still risen considerably.

Of course, the danger levels had also risen - not much, not much at all, but enough he didn't think it was just statistical variance - they had also risen in between Dick moving out and Jason moving in.

So maybe he didn't need a Robin. He needed a kid.

Dick had still been his even after he moved out, of course, but he wouldn't have been dependent anymore.

And that was what Batman needed. A reason to come home and take off the suit each night. A reason it wasn't alright for him to give his life fighting for the city just yet. A reason to hold back and remain someone to look up to. A reason to be Bruce Wayne and not just Batman.

He needed a kid.

Which was a problem. If a Robin was all he needed, then Tim thought he could figure something out. He could talk Mr. Wayne into letting him have the position if he had to.

But he couldn't exactly just move into Wayne Manor and inform Mr. Wayne that Tim would be his new son. Tim's obvious failings aside, Mr. Wayne would likely view adopting a new child right away as replacing Jason.

Jason was irreplaceable, of course. It had been obvious in every interview and photograph how much Jason had been loved. The point wasn't to replace the person, it was to get someone to take up the beacon of light he'd held. An addition to a legacy, not a replacement.

Still, the position of being a vigilante's partner could be a matter for trained candidates. Children were something else entirely. Even if he could find Dick, it wouldn't entirely solve the problem, and Mr. Wayne just wasn't ready yet.

He frowned. He'd take it slow then.

* * *

The first time Alfred saw the ad requesting volunteers from the Youth Center in the mail, he confiscated it before Master Bruce could see it.

The second time, he called the number provided and politely requested that they be removed from the mailing list. The receptionist on the other end obliged.

The third time, it was from a different facility, and he was starting to feel a bit troubled over the matter. They could not help every worthy cause, of course, but if things had gone a different way, it could have been young Master Jason there in need of assistance, and it didn't sit right with him to entirely ignore it.

The fourth time decided his feelings, and he exercised his first day off since the tragedy to go volunteer at the center.

Unbeknownst to Alfred the fifth one came while he was away. If he had been there, he would have seen Master Bruce stare at it for several long minutes before crumpling it up and throwing it at the wall.

He also would have seen Master Bruce come back a few minutes later and carefully retrieve it, straightening out the wrinkles like it was something precious, and calling the number listed to make a sizable donation.

* * *

Tim's careful surveillance indicated that Mr. Wayne hadn't gone to volunteer. It was possible Tim had just missed it - it was harder to watch him as Mr. Wayne than it was to watch Batman - but he was pretty sure he was right.

That was unfortunate but not entirely unexpected. People ignored that kind of mail all the time. Even if Mr. Wayne had looked at it at all, he might not want to meet up with kids that reminded him too much of Jason.

He would have to meet some kids eventually, though. Tim would make sure of it.

* * *

Stage two was to go to the next Wayne party. It was the first since Jason's death, and while Tim hadn't technically been invited, his parents had, and they were out of the country. He would simply go in their stead.

And he was taking Anna with him.

Anna was a year younger than him, in beginning acting classes, and in the foster system. Judging from some careful eavesdropping and rumor gathering, she was more or less alright with her current living situation but wasn't being particularly closely watched by her foster parents. If stage two was more of an unqualified success than he was predicting, she should be alright transferring houses.

In the meantime, she was perfectly happy to tell her foster-parents that she was spending the night at a friend's house and to accept fifty dollars from Tim to attend Mr. Wayne's party with him.

As best Tim could tell, Anna was the perfect candidate. Like Jason and Dick, she had dark hair and blue eyes, close enough to pass as related to Mr. Wayne by blood. A girl would be easier to explain his presence at a party with, however, and he thought a girl might be better anyway. Mr. Wayne might feel like adopting a daughter was less of an insult to Jason's memory than getting another son.

Anna adjusted her best dress in his parent's bathroom mirror. "So all I have to do is attend the party and talk to Mr. Wayne at least once?" she checked.

"That's it," he confirmed. The dress wouldn't be quite good enough for the party, but he hadn't been able to come up with a non-creepy way to offer to buy her another one.

"Okay." Anna tugged at her dress one more time and turned to look at him. "And you're willing to pay me fifty dollars for this because . . . ?"

"Because my parents make me turn in an account of how I spend my allowance, and I'm slowly escalating to ever more ridiculous things to see how long it takes for them to notice," Tim said promptly.

A lie, of course. He'd given up on getting their attention ages ago.

"You have a crazy big allowance," she said. The rest of it made perfect sense to her. Then she took a deep breath. "Okay. Time to get in character." A smile slowly grew across her face, and she brightly offered her arm to Tim.

Showtime.

* * *

The party went well. Mr. Wayne approached Anna of his own volition at the buffet table and steered her towards some of the more kid friendly foods. He was actually smiling a bit by the end of the conversation, and it was a real smile, not the fake one he'd been wearing all evening.

Tim paid Anna seventy-five dollars and began plotting to bring her to the next party.

A week later, Anna didn't show up to school. Apparently, she'd been sent to a new foster home outside of Gotham.

Tim swallowed back a feeling that felt a little too much like missing her.

Back to the drawing board.

* * *

Jason had been killed just for being Mr. Wayne's son. If Mr. Wayne was ever going to allow himself to get close to another kid, he'd have to believe the kid really, truly needed him or he wouldn't risk it.

Maybe, Tim thought, as he climbed a bit higher on the gargoyle's back so he could get a better shot of Batman's fight with Two-Face, maybe he could arrange for Batman to come across a kid on patrol?

Except he really didn't feel good about asking a kid to put themselves in danger like that, whether he was paying them or not. There was too much that could go wrong.

Like right now for instance, when from his vantage point three stories above the ground he could see the men creeping in from the shadows while Batman remained totally focused on beating Mr. Dent into the ground.

 _Too violent. Too reckless._

Tim sat frozen on the gargoyle.

Surely he'd noticed. Surely he had a plan. Surely.

One of them raised a gun.

"Batman!" he screamed.

Batman whirled towards him, and the bullet missed him, just clipping the edge of his swirling cape.

Batman knew the men were there now, and he tore his way through them. Tim clutched his camera tightly. He was close enough to get some incredible shots, but -

Batman was bleeding. It had happened before, and it always gave him a sick feeling in his stomach, and he'd never even been involved before.

A shot rang out. It went wild, ricocheting off the gargoyle beneath them. Tim bit back a cry.

Batman was taking two of the thugs down. A third was raising his gun, and Batman wasn't going to get there in time.

Tim grabbed a piece of loose rock off the gargoyle and hurled it at the man's head.

He missed, but just barely. It hit the man's arm instead, and the man spun to try and find the threat.

Batman took him down from behind.

And then Batman looked up.

Looked up right at Tim.

Tim gulped.

"Don't move," Batman ordered. Tim expected him to start tying up the groaning criminals, but instead he headed towards the building Tim was perched on and started to climb.

Tim might could still slip away. If he was fast. Batman hadn't gotten a good look at him yet.

This was Batman. There was no way he could slip away now that he'd been caught.

So Tim sat frozen as Batman climbed the building.

The confusing thing was that Batman kept talking as he climbed up. Saying things like, "Just stay right there," and "Don't move," and "It's going to be alright."

Tim didn't quite understand this. Did Batman think he'd been hit by one of the stray bullets? One had come close after all. It was dark. Even Batman couldn't see everything.

He thought about telling Batman he was fine, but Batman might not be thinking that at all, and then Tim would just look stupid, so he kept his mouth shut.

* * *

There was a child precariously perched on the edge of a gargoyle, and the second Bruce had seen it, his chest had gone tight.

He'd been lucky since Jason had - Since Jason. He hadn't had to deal with children all that much.

But now there was another dark haired little boy just a hairsbreadth from death, and it all threatened to come crashing down again.

Finally, _finally_ he reached the top of the building. "Stay right where you are," he commanded as gently as he could through the panicked tightness in his throat. He reached for the boy with both arms and snatched him back to the safety of the roof.

Safe. He let himself hold on for a few seconds longer than was strictly necessary. He hadn't realized how much his arms had ached from missing this until suddenly the ache was gone.

But he wasn't Dick, wasn't Jason, wasn't _his_ , and he had no right to keep holding on, so he let go. "What were you doing up there?" he growled.

"Um." The boy bit his lip. His hands twisted around his camera.

Camera. "You were taking pictures."

The boy gulped.

"Who were you taking pictures for?"

"Nobody!" The boy sounded horrified. "I never show them to anyone."

"Never implies that you've done this before."

The boy glanced over the side of the building. "Two-Face looks like he's about to get up," he said nervously. "Shouldn't you be tying him up?"

He hesitated. He did need to do that. He also needed answers.

But the boy would have nowhere to go.

"Stay here," he growled at the boy. The boy nodded rapidly.

But when Bruce returned after securing the criminals, the boy was gone.

* * *

Tim knew he should stay away for a while. He knew he should.

But if last night had proven anything, it was that Batman needed him. He couldn't give up now.

So he would just follow. He had done it for years without being caught. As long as he was careful, he could manage it again.

So he meant to just follow. He didn't even plan to take any pictures.

But at one point, Batman was crouched up on a roof, overlooking his city, and the silhouette and the symbolism were too perfect. He took the shot.

For a glorious five minutes, he thought he had gotten away with it.

Then he lost him.

He wasn't _too_ worried about it. He'd lost Batman plenty of times before either because he simply couldn't follow him without more advanced gear or because he legitimately had no idea quite where the man had gone.

He gave himself twenty minutes to try and track him down again based on his usual patrol routes. If he couldn't find him in that amount of time, he'd head home for the night.

He shimmied down the drainpipe he'd used to climb up the the fourth story balcony and turned to jog down the alleyway.

And slammed right into Batman.

He reeled back from the impact. Two heavy, gauntleted hands came up and caught his shoulders. They restrained him as much as they balanced him, but Tim couldn't help blinking in sheer shock all the same because Batman was touching him, touching him again, and he couldn't help leaning into the touch just a little.

"You shouldn't be out here."

"Someone has to," Tim argued before he could think better of it. "Someone needs to make sure you're alright."

"You're ten." Batman's tone indicated quite clearly what he thought of this.

"I'm _thirteen,"_ he protested. "A small thirteen, admittedly, but. Still."

Batman didn't seem to think much of that. "Go home. Or I'll tell your parents what you've been doing."

"Good luck with that," Tim muttered.

Batman's hands tightened on his shoulders, and his whole posture seemed to soften slightly in sympathy. Tim winced a little as he realized what conclusion Batman must have drawn.

If he'd recognized Tim he would have known better, but Tim didn't blame him for not. Tim didn't often go to his parents' parties, and even at the party he'd attended with Anna, he'd stayed in the background.

"You can't stay out here."

"I'm not going home." Tim matched his tone as best he could and then threw down his trump card. "Mr. Wayne."

The man was silent for a beat too long before he said, "What."

Tim rolled his eyes. "I saw Robin do his quadruple flip once. The same flip I saw him do at the circus when I was a kid. After that it was just a matter of matching up height, weight, and injuries. I won't tell," he assured him. "But I'm not going to stop following you either. Especially not after what I saw last time."

Mr. Wayne still didn't say anything. Tim was a little worried that he might be in shock.

"Car. Now."

Tim gulped a little but followed him obediently to the Batmobile.

* * *

Barbara wasn't in the cave that night. She hadn't been since -

Bruce resolutely looked away from the glass case he kept Dick's Robin costume in, still waiting for his return.

She still watched for him most nights, but she could do that elsewhere easily enough. It wasn't worth the commute to do it from here unless there was something big going on.

If Dick was still here, it might have been different.

But Dick wasn't here.

He took a deep breath and pulled the car to a stop inside the Cave. The boy was out of it in a second, eyes wide.

"Whoa." Just like that, the camera was up and flashing.

Bruce got out of the car and walked over, hand closing firmly over the camera. "No."

The boy looked up at him thoughtfully. "What if I left the camera in the Cave? Then you wouldn't have to worry about the pictures leaking."

"What would be the point of taking the pictures then?"

"I could develop them down here too." The boy looked around. "Some of those passages look dark enough. Then you could keep the finished pictures down here."

That sounded like a lot of time in the Cave.

The kid looked up at him stubbornly. "Look. I know you've been getting hurt more. I know you've been hurting other people more."

Bruce stiffened.

"You need someone."

"I have someone." Oracle still watched. Alfred still waited with bandages.

"Oracle's still in the game, then? I haven't gotten close enough to hear you talk to her for a while."

Bruce really needed to work on his situational awareness if the kid had gotten that close.

The kid waved it off. "You need someone here. Someone waiting for you. And I can either come down here every night and be that person or I can follow you around every night. Your choice."

Bruce was pretty sure he could find some more choices than that but for them to be effective, he needed to know more about who he was dealing with.

"You can stay tonight. Agent A will watch you. After that, we'll see."

The boy grinned and started bouncing on his feet. "Yes!"

So enthusiastic. Just like -

Bruce called Alfred down and warned him to put on a domino.

Although since the first words out of Tim's mouth upon seeing him were, "Hello, Mr. Pennyworth," Bruce didn't think it helped.

* * *

Facial recognition software on the Cave's cameras confirmed what Bruce had suspected since he escorted the boy home in the small hours of the morning. The boy was Timothy Drake, and his parents were very much alive.

They were, however, out of the country and would be for another four months, so Tim's comment about contacting them stood. Unless Bruce wanted to call them as Batman, his options were limited.

And, he realized with growing concern as he scrolled through the financials Oracle had sent him, the parents' options for controlling their son's nightly activities would be rather limited as well.

There were records of food being ordered for their house. There were records of a maid being paid to come and clean once a week. There were records of payments being made for Tim to attend martial arts classes.

There were no records of anyone being paid to watch Tim while his parents were gone.

It was possible, he supposed that someone was watching Tim and simply not being paid to do so. A relative, maybe.

A quick check into that possibility was not encouraging.

Growing concern edged with anger coiled in his chest. The Drake's son was alive, alive and brave and brilliant, and they couldn't even be bothered -

He took a deep breath and forced his hand to release the edge of the desk.

"Some tea to calm your nerves, Master Bruce?"

Bruce accepted it automatically. "Thank you, Alfred."

Alfred peered over his shoulder at the picture that currently dominated the screen - Tim's parents, off at yet another archeological dig. "Looking into Master Timothy's parents, I see."

Bruce looked up, frowning. Tim's name wasn't currently visible on the screens.

Alfred raised his eyebrows. "You did ask his name before jumping straight to your investigation, I trust?"

Bruce took a sip of tea instead of answering.

Alfred sighed. "World's greatest detective, indeed."

Bruce hunched in a little bit, feeling uncomfortably like he was eight years old again and being gently scolded for his manners. "What were your impressions of him?" Unspoken was the question he couldn't quite bring himself to ask about such a small boy, _Is he a threat?_

Alfred seemed to hear it anyway, and his expression grew slightly disapproving. "Master Timothy appears to be a very lonely young man. He looks up to you quite a bit, but he is increasingly concerned for you." _As am I,_ Alfred's tone implied.

Bruce dodged the comment. "He's in that house all alone. I don't like it." He remembered all too well being alone in empty, echoing halls. He could call social services, he supposed, but in Gotham that was always a rather hit or miss concept.

"We could always keep an eye on him while his parents are unavailable," Alfred said blandly.

Bruce's hand tightened around the mouse. "I won't endanger another child."

"He will be at school most of the day anyway," Alfred pointed out, "and he's old enough that a few hours alone in the afternoon should be acceptable. If you continue to allow him to cover over at night, he will have at least some supervision. It never has to be widely known."

The idea had appeal. Selfish appeal, he reminded himself sternly.

But . . . Tim needed help. Surely - surely, it couldn't hurt. Just to try.

Something in his face must have betrayed his decision because Alfred was suddenly radiating approval for the first time in quite awhile. "Excellent. I'll be sure to have some refreshments for tomorrow night's endeavors."

And that, Bruce supposed, was that.

* * *

They settled into a routine quickly enough. Tim would come over just before Bruce headed out and would chatter about his progress photographing the Cave and about what he'd noticed of Bruce's activities the night before. Bruce would leave to fight and come back to Tim munching on Alfred's cookies and shooting pictures from increasingly unlikely locations.

Then came the night that he brought in the materials for his dark room. Two nights after, he kept shooting glances at Bruce until Alfred finally broke in and said, "I believe Master Timothy has something to show you."

Tim blushed. "I, um, finished developing the pictures. I could show you? If you want?"

"Alright."

Tim hurried to the passage he'd been using as a dark room and returned with a binder filled with clear sheet protectors. Bruce opened it up curiously.

It was nothing like what he'd expected. To him, photographs meant crime scenes, business like snapshots of horror, or tabloids, with shaky pictures that never told the whole truth. This - this was nothing like that.

There was a wide shot that somehow captured the vastness of the Cave and brought with it a sense of wonder that Bruce hadn't felt for the place for a long time. There was a warm picture of milk and cookies perched beside a stack of batarangs beside the computer. A stunning shot of the bats swarming at the top of the Cave.

And in the middle of the dozens of shots, there was a picture of the Robin costume that took his breath away.

It looked . . . lonely, in the picture. Lonely and desperately sad. His fingers trembled on top of the photograph.

Tim peered over to see which one was stopped on and swallowed hard. "Oh." He fiddled with the camera still hanging from his neck. "I've been trying not to ask, but - He's okay, isn't he? He's not - " He bit his lip, expression desperately anxious.

"He's alright," Bruce said hoarsely. "He left Gotham." _Left me._ "It's safer that way." _Better off, far away from Bruce and his poisonous touch._

Tim's expression cleared. "Oh, good."

Bruce looked back at the pictures. A black and white shot of Alfred in a domino mask. Him emerging from the Batmobile, cape swirling around him. A picture that must have been from before Bruce caught him of Batman silhouetted against the sky.

"These are good," he admitted quietly.

"I could bring my others tomorrow if you want," Tim offered. "I mean, you don't have to look at them, but they're probably safer here - "

"Bring them," Bruce said. "I'd like to see."

Tim looked almost surprised but a shy smile spread across his face. "Alright. Thank you, Mr. Wayne."

"Bruce," he said without quite thinking it through. "Call me Bruce."

* * *

If the pictures of the Cave had been good, the pictures of the streets were breathtaking.

And by that Bruce meant both that they were very good and that he'd had to stop a take a deep breath whenever he realized just how close to the action Tim had gotten.

The pictures did present a problem though. Tim couldn't keep taking pictures of the Cave forever, nor could Alfred stay down here every night to watch him.

"It has been a while since Miss Gordon has come by," Alfred observed that night after Tim left. "Have you considered asking her to train Master Timothy as an assistant?"

Bruce froze in his work on the computer. Dick had done that. Jason had done that. If Tim did that, it felt like claiming Tim as his.

Tim had parents of his own. Bruce had proven that his life was too dangerous for children.

But Tim's parents didn't seem to want him. And no one would know.

"That's a good idea," he finally said.

He wasn't stealing Tim, he convinced himself. He was just looking after him for awhile.

* * *

"So you're the new kid." Barbara was careful to keep her tone neutral. She wasn't sure yet what she thought of Bruce's latest child snatching project. On the one hand, the records she'd pulled definitely indicated something was up in his home life and having him around seemed to have helped Bruce considerably.

On the other hand, she wasn't entirely comfortable with the idea of Bruce getting a kid to help him control his more violent urges, nor did she feel entirely safe around a kid who had guessed three secret identities like they were cliche plot twists which was why tonight she was wearing a mask that covered considerably more than a domino.

Which didn't stop the kid from saying, "And you're Barbara Gordon," in a tone that was just a little bit awed.

She considered denying it, but -

She tore the mask off. "How," she said flatly.

The kid winced apologetically. "The red hair and the - " He gestured helplessly at the wheelchair. "Which would have just been identifying markers that I couldn't do much with, except Dick's dating Barbara Gordon who shares those same features, and it makes sense that you would all know each other. Does Commissioner Gordon know?"

She started pulling up the surveillance cameras they would need for the evening to cover her flinch when he mentioned Dick. "No. And if you ever want to be able to use a computer with an internet connection again, he won't find out."

"Okay." The kid seemed surprisingly unfazed by this. "What do I need to know?"

She walked him through the basics that night - how to switch between cameras, how to notice the more obvious problems, how to call it in. Eventually he'd need to know how to hack properly, but for now she could get him in, and he could help her keep an eye on Gotham. In a week or two, when she knew him better, she could walk him through how to use the rescue bats.

The kid was a fast learner, she admitted a tad grudgingly. And he didn't have the need for constant movement that Dick or Jason -

She took a deep breath and forced herself to finish the thought. He wasn't always moving like Dick was, or Jason had.

He did have a tendency to chatter when he got excited about something, but, well. The comm had been too quiet since Dick left anyway.

When she was finally turning the cameras off and was just waiting for Bruce to come back to the Cave - and why was the kid still here? Didn't he have a bedtime? - the kid turned to her and blurted out, "Can I take your picture?"

She blinked at him. "What?"

"It would stay in the Cave," he assured her. He gestured towards the back of the Cave. "I develop them back there and there's a binder I keep them in after that. I don't care if I get to keep them, I just like taking them."

Well, if it was staying in the Cave, and if Bruce was alright with it . . . "Okay."

His grin split his face. "Thanks!" He started packing up his stuff.

"Er, kid?"

"Not now," he said, shaking his head dismissively. "I'll do it tomorrow when you're not waiting for it. You get better shots that way."

Okay then. "You did well tonight," she told him. "We'll whip you into a proper assistant in no time."

Now his grin was soft and shy.

Okay. She gave in. She liked the kid.

She reached over and ruffled his hair. "You did well, Tim."

* * *

There ended up being three pictures of Barbara. The first was of her in her element, fingers flying, face fierce. Oracle, in other words. The second was of her laughing. It was more of a wistful laugh than anything else, and the camera caught the way she looked over to the Robin case as she did it.

The final one was the second night after an Arkham breakout that included the Joker. It was taken so late at night that it was actually pretty firmly morning and had there been windows, light might have starting to creep into the room. Her head was cushioned on her arms by the computer. A pair of hands - Alfred's - was removing the mug and the now empty jug of coffee that had been her constant companions for the last forty-eight hours.

She looked young in the picture. Young and weary, even in sleep.

Bruce's hands ghosted over all three pictures. He smiled at the first two and paused over the last.

The light glinted off Barbara's wheelchair in the photo. She looked so _tired._

 _This is what you've dragged your children into. This is what you've done to them._

* * *

"You need to train."

Tim blinked up at him. "I thought that's what I was doing."

"Not with the computers." He nodded towards the exercise mats. "The Cave should be safe, but it's been attacked before."

Tim's eyes widened in understanding. "Okay." He nodded eagerly. "When do you want to start?"

"Come early tomorrow."

He'd train him like he had Dick. Long and hard till he'd be safe on the streets if he ever took to roaming them again.

If he'd trained Jason like that, he might still be alive.

Tim dropped his martial arts classes and just started coming over to the manor in the afternoons instead. He'd wait in the kitchen with Alfred until Bruce got home, and then they'd get to work.

It was hard work, but Tim didn't mind learning, especially since the better he got, the more tension started to slowly fade from Bruce's shoulders. Besides, the better he got, the more good he was to Bruce as a sparring partner, and that was something Bruce definitely needed with Dick gone. For now Bruce had to go through the exercises alone, and while that had led to some great pictures, it wasn't ideal for training.

Tim made mistakes, of course, but most of the time it didn't matter. Bruce was careful with him.

Once and only once, in a session when they were both exhausted, Tim didn't block in time, and Bruce was too slow to check the blow. Bruce's fist crashed into his face hard enough to knock him into the ground.

Tim turned it into a roll and came up with his arms ready just like he'd been taught. Bruce was frozen, staring at what Tim was pretty sure was a pretty spectacular mark on his face.

He poked at it gently. "It's alright," he reassured Bruce. "My parents extended their trip again, so they won't be home for another few weeks. It should be healed up by then." The teachers at school might ask questions, but Tim was less concerned about that. Even if both concealer and misdirection should fail, his teachers would have no reason to think Bruce Wayne would have anything to do with what would no doubt be an explosively colorful bruise.

Bruce's jaw tightened. "Go up to Alfred. Get some ice."

Tim frowned. "I'm fine. We can keep going."

 _"Now."_

Alfred tutted and started rummaging for an ice pack without being asked when he came up to the kitchen. "First major training accident, I see. And how did Master Bruce take it?"

Tim held the offered ice gingerly to his face. "I think he's mad. I should have blocked that hit."

"I have no doubt that Master Bruce is indeed angry, but I think you may have misdiagnosed the target, young Master Timothy." Alfred paused for a moment. "Perhaps I should go check on him."

"No need," Bruce growled.

Tim jumped. Alfred didn't seem at all surprised. He did, however, frown with disapproval as his eyes flicked down to Bruce's bleeding knuckles.

"Shall I order a new punching bag?" he asked deceptively mildly.

Bruce's jaw clenched further. "It's still functional."

"As your knuckles won't be if you don't take proper safety precautions. Sit."

Bruce sat.

His eyes bored into Tim for a few moments before he sighed and said, "I've been pushing you too hard."

"No!" Tim protested immediately. "I can take it."

"You shouldn't have to," Bruce growled. He took a deep breath and began again. "There's no rush. You don't have to turn into a master overnight."

"You need a sparring partner," Tim pointed out.

"This isn't about what I need."

Tim begged to differ.

Something of that must have shown in his face because Bruce started rubbing his head as if to rid himself of a headache. "Your safety is more important than what I need," Bruce tried again.

"Gotham is more important than my safety," Tim corrected.

"Alfred," Bruce said helplessly.

"I can't imagine what to say, Master Bruce. Young Master Timothy is, after all, the only charge I've had to ever express such a sentiment."

 _"Alfred."_

"Perhaps a step back is in order," Alfred suggested smoothly. "A little less time spent training to fight in order to accommodate some practice escaping."

As long as he was training, Tim was alright with it. A new kind of stress lined Bruce's forehead, but he agreed. "Tomorrow, then."

"Excellent. Supper should ready in a few minutes, sir, if you and Master Timothy care to vacate to the dining room."

Tim jumped down from his stool. Bruce reached out and laid a hesitant hand on his shoulder as he passed. From the look on his face, he half-expected Tim to flinch from it, but Tim wasn't sure why.

"I'm sorry, Tim."

"It's fine," Tim assured him again.

He made sure to wear plenty of concealer until the bruise healed so that Bruce wouldn't have to look at it. Bruce was painfully careful anyway.

* * *

Tim normally resisted the urge to go through the computer files in the Cave. There was one, however, that had been necessary to go through so that he didn't do something stupid and mess it all up. He'd read it again and again until he'd all but memorized it.

Which was why when he reached the next level of his escape training and Bruce tied him to a chair, he recognized the knot.

He'd spent hours researching how to get out of just that position. The practice was a bit different from the theory, but he still managed it in thirty minutes.

He practiced and practiced until he could get out of it in less than one.

Bruce jerked his head in a tight nod. "Well done."

Tim had never felt Jason's presence hang quite so heavy in the Cave as it did then. He wasn't entirely sure what to do about it. He tried hesitantly reaching out to squeeze Bruce's arm like Bruce always squeezed his shoulder.

Bruce's arm jerked away from the touch, and Tim shrank back, but then Bruce's arms were all the way around him like they hadn't been since the first night. Tim was pressed so tightly against Bruce's chest that he wondered if the man could feel the too fast patter of his heart and thought that might be the point.

The hug felt warmer than even the freshest batch of Alfred's cookies, and Tim burrowed into it.

He wasn't sure if the hug was meant for him or for Jason, but just at that moment, he didn't really care.

* * *

When Tim's parents finally came home, Bruce expected to have to accept Tim being at the manor less.

This was true. Technically. But not by much.

"They haven't noticed," Tim assured him.

That wasn't nearly as reassuring as Tim seemed to think.

* * *

Tim came over nearly right after school for training, so it only made sense for Tim to eat supper with them. Tim stayed to help Barbara in the Cave. On nights when he stayed late, or, as happened a few times, was sick, he slept in a room upstairs that was slowly making the transition from "guest room" to "his."

It was getting harder and harder to remind himself that Tim wasn't his.

* * *

Dick hadn't called home in months. When he did call, he called Barbara.

"He might be in Bludhaven for a few more months," she said quietly. She'd waited until he got back from patrol to tell him. That had probably been a good idea.

Bruce nodded and then headed swiftly back into one of the darker passages so Barbara wouldn't see him gasping in unsteady breaths as he tried desperately to breathe.

* * *

Batman went down.

Tim stared, wide eyed, as Joker's men trussed him up on the grainy screen.

"Keep eyes on them at all times," Barbara snapped. Her fingers flew across the keyboard as she sent the rescue bats zooming through the city. "We'll knock them out if we can, or send one of these in to cut him loose if we can't."

Tim nodded tightly. On the screen, the Joker was leaning over Bruce. "He's messing with the cowl," he reported. His voice came out a little squeaky.

"No," Barbara breathed.

But the Joker didn't pull it off. Instead, he yanked out the little black comm.

"Hello, hello, hello! Are those bats I see racing to the rescue?" The Joker gave an exaggerated pout for the nearest security camera. "I was hoping to see a real bird tonight. It's been such a long time since I got to go birdwatching. Oh, well!"

He pressed a big red button. The security cameras went dead.

And the rescue bats control screens blinked. _Error. Error. Error._

"That'll have taken out the tracking signal," Barbara hissed. "Help me pull up the cameras for the side streets _now,_ we have to follow the route - There."

"What do we do?" Tim whispered. "He wants Robin. Could Dick - "

Barbara was already shaking her head. "He's in Bludhaven. That's hours away. We might not have that long."

Bludhaven. Nightwing. The pieces clicked together in Tim's head, but that didn't matter right now.

"The bats?"

Barbara shook her head, the movement tight with self-directed fury. "I should have left some in reserve."

"What's done is done." Alfred appeared behind them. His voice was perfectly steady, but his face was white. "The police, then, or shall I go get the old Master Wayne's shotgun?"

The police were all but overwhelmed with the traps Joker had left all around the city.

"I could be Robin," Tim blurted out.

The others turned to him. "What?" Barbara said.

"He wants Robin," Tim pointed out. "I know Dick's suit won't fit me - "

"Jason's Halloween costume would," Barbara said. She winced as soon as she said it like she regretted the suggestion, but - "Dick thought it was hilarious. It would be a bit big, but that just means we might could fit some armor in under it." She was considering it.

"I've been training," he reminded them. "I can do this."

He felt like he was about to throw up, but Batman needed him. _Bruce_ needed him.

Barbara made the call. "Alfred, get the costume and whatever armor will fit best. Tim, grab some of the knockout gas, something to cut the rope, and something to pick locks, just in case. Then help me into the old Batmobile. Alfred, you'll be on the cameras. Keep us updated." She grabbed a spare comm from the table and jammed it into Tim's ear. "You do exactly what Alfred and I tell you, understand?"

Tim nodded shakily as he ran to obey.

When he was as kitted out as he was going to get, he went to help Barbara into the car. He paused just outside it. "Um. Who's driving?"

"Me." Barbara said tensely. "Bruce modified this one so I could drive it. Now get in."

* * *

The Batmobile roared through the night. Barbara's hands were white around the wheel. The Oracle mask she'd worn the first time they'd met hid her face. "Follow the plan."

It was the fifth time she'd said some variation of that. Tim nodded anyway.

"Turn right to drop Master Timothy off. Then circle around to reach the warehouse," Alfred said over the comm.

Barbara jerked the wheel. At the same moment, Tim flung open the door and jumped out of the car, tucking into a roll to use up his momentum.

It was a move Bruce had taught him to get away from kidnappers. It worked just as well here.

He'd been deposited directly behind the warehouse. There was a locked door right ahead. He checked it quickly for traps before getting out the lock picking kit.

"Impact in ten," Barbara said just as the lock clicked open.

Tim mouthed down the seconds.

Nine.

Eight.

Seven.

Six.

Five.

Four.

Three.

Two.

One.

The Batmobile crashed through the front of the warehouse.

Tim cracked the door open and slipped inside.

The car had lost momentum crashing through the doors, but Oracle had gunned it once again and had the car aimed straight at the largest group of Joker's goons. The Joker himself was nowhere to be seen, but Bruce was tied up in the middle of the floor. Judging by the way he was slumped, he was still drugged up. In the rafters above, an enormous birdcage with no bottom hung ominously, waiting to fall.

Tim slid one of the batarangs across the floor. It banged into Bruce's hands, and Tim winced. He hadn't meant to slide it quite so hard.

Bruce slowly started to work the batarang so it would free his hands, but drugged as he was, a little help would make it go a lot faster. Tim just didn't dare while that cage was still up there.

The posts that held up the rafters looked eminently climbable. Just what he would have been looking for back when he was following Batman around Gotham.

He clambered up the post as quick as he could. Barbara was still using the car as a battering ram, and the thugs were quite sufficiently distracted.

Tim pulled himself up onto a rafter. The cage, he could see now, was held up with a thick, probably reinforced rope. There was a lever right next to it if he wanted to lower it, but there weren't any immediate options to prevent it from being lowered.

"Robin!" a voice crowed from behind him.

Tim spun.

He'd seen the Joker before, of course. In pictures, mostly, but in a fight with Batman once or twice if only at a distance.

He didn't look frightening in person. Odd, sure, but Tim was well used to odd. He didn't have the sheer physical presence of Bane or the gruesome wrongness of Killer Croc. He didn't even have the subtle sense of dark power that Tim had felt once from an elegant woman who had confronted Batman after an attack of what Tim could only call ninjas.

He was just . . . odd, standing there with his hands in his suit pockets and grinning, like it was perfectly normal to be standing on the rafters and like Robin was an old friend he was happy to greet. Casual. Friendly.

Then his smile faded and -

Tim took a step back.

Joker strolled forward. "My, how you've grown," he crooned. "Grown backwards. What a remarkable feat!" The emphasis on the words was all wrong, and Tim felt a prickling on his spine now that he hadn't before, now that he was close enough to see the Joker's eyes.

The plan had never been to fight the Joker head on. Tim's hand went automatically to one of the gas bombs in his belt, but they were too high off the floor. If he knocked the Joker off, he had no way to be sure the man wouldn't fall to his death. Maybe he wouldn't at the height they were at. Maybe -

In his moment of hesitation, the Joker sprang.

Tim's training kicked in. He lashed out, but the Joker's momentum carried him forward, letting him pin Tim to the rafter they balanced on. His arm pressed down on Tim's throat. His knife - a knife, why had Tim not seen the knife? - tugged gently at the edge of Tim's mouth.

"You know," the Joker said brightly, "I think I know a secret." He leaned down and whispered confidingly in Tim's ear. "I don't think you're Robin at all. I think you're a cuckoo who's snuck into the nest." He laughed like it was the funniest thing he'd ever heard.

Cuckoo. Fake. Imposter. Parasite.

"Maybe," Tim choked out, heedless of the knife.

Then he grabbed onto the Joker with both hands and _rolled,_ sending them careening off the edge.

 _But either way, I'm still a bird._

* * *

"What. Were. You. Thinking."

Tim winced away from Bruce's glare at the end of the Cave's hospital bed and then winced again, more carefully, at the pain it had caused his broken ribs. "I was thinking that if I couldn't disarm the trap, then I could at least stop anyone from activating it. Also," he took a deep breath and tried to ignore the pain, "the Joker had me pinned, I didn't have the skills to fight him, and no one else was available. I had to do something unexpected." And everyone had lived, including the Joker, so obviously it had paid off.

Bruce must have noticed the pained look on Tim's face because he was Batman and annoyingly perceptive like that. "Alfred? Tim needs more pain meds." His voice was carefully controlled now. He kept that control while Alfred hurried over, but it looked like it was a near thing. "And why were you in a position to be facing him in the first place?"

"I approved it," Barbara said firmly from her place on the other side of the bed. "This isn't on Tim."

"Why," Bruce demanded through gritted teeth.

Alfred carefully increased the dosage of the pain meds in the IV drip. "If you cannot recall the reason why, perhaps you have a concussion after all, Master Bruce."

Barbara was blunter. "I'd have called Dick if I could have, but he was too far away. You would have died."

"Then you should have let me die!" Bruce exploded.

That was the first time Tim had ever seen Alfred drop something.

Barbara had gone very white. "You don't mean that."

"Better me than - " Bruce gritted the words out before grinding to a halt. In a completely flat tone, he said, "I will die before I lose another son."

Tim's world had started to blur at the edges from the drugs, but those words grabbed him even in his dazed state.

"No," he managed to get out. No, it was never supposed to be like this. He was supposed to help Mr. Wayne get another kid, someone who deserved to be part of his family, someone to give him a reason to live, not to selfishly take the place for himself and lead them all to this. " _No_. Gotham needs - " It was hard to find words through the haze of the drug. "Batman. No. You. All of you." Batman's courage and Bruce Wayne's generosity, Barbara's watching eyes, and Alfred's shadowed support. "Not me. No one needs me."

"That's not true," Barbara said instantly, at the same moment that Alfred said, "Master Timothy, I must object - "

It was Bruce he was trying to focus on, though, and it was Bruce who hobbled over, still constrained by his own injuries, and sat on the edge of the bed. One hand wrapped almost painfully tightly around his shoulder, but the other reached up very gently to cradle his head. "I never wanted you to be in danger," he said quietly. "I want to protect you because despite what you think, you matter very much."

Something warm bubbled up in Tim's chest. Despite his best efforts, though, his eyes started to drift closed. He was afraid Bruce would move, but his hand just started carding soothingly through his hair instead.

"I told you it was too soon for this conversation," Barbara said wearily.

"I know."

"And I know you're scared, but you really could have handled that better."

" . . . I know."

The wheels of her chair squeaked as she rolled across the floor. "Still. Good job at the end there."

There was a long pause before Alfred broke it by saying, "It has been several hours now and is now well into the daylight hours."

"Tim can afford to miss a few days of school." Bruce just sounded tired now.

"Indeed. However, things are complicated slightly. You will remember, sir, that Master Timothy's parents are currently in the country."

Tim waited for a moment in the hopes that someone else would say something. When no one did, he forced himself awake enough to slur out, "'s okay. Won't notice."

Then he was out.

* * *

Despite the potential consequences for his secret, Bruce had devoutly hoped that Tim was wrong.

Tim was not wrong.

Or, rather, after a day or two they had indeed noticed that he was injured, but they had accepted his vague explanation of an accident as good enough for broken ribs, a fractured leg, and bruises that nearly consumed one side of his face. The injuries didn't prevent them from leaving again a few days later.

Bruce liked to think he was a patient man, but his patience was all used up.

Bruce promptly ordered Tim back to the manor until his injuries healed up.

Then he got to work.

* * *

Dick knew that someone had broken into his apartment the second he got to the door. Whoever had gotten was a good lock pick if they had gotten past said door, but not good enough to hide the evidence. If that hadn't been enough proof, there was always the light spilling out from under the door that he knew he hadn't left on.

He couldn't say he was entirely surprised. It wasn't that he was in a particularly bad neighborhood in Bludhaven, it was just that Bludhaven essentially was just one _big_ bad neighborhood, and nowhere was ever particularly safe.

He drew his gun silently and slid into the room.

The front door opened right into the apartment's living/dining area. The intruder was sitting right at the kitchen table, chewing his lip in impatience.

Or. He said intruder.

The better description would be, "the kid." He kept the gun ready as he quickly went through the house for other threats just in case it was some kind of trap, but no, it was just the kid.

The kid who had held his hands up instantly in surrender. "We need to talk about Batman," he said the instant Dick reentered the kitchen, holstering his gun. "He's about to do something stupid." His eyes were fixed on Dick like he held all the answers in the world.

Dick wasn't sure which part of that sentence concerned him more. "And this concerns me why?" he asked. If the kid knew enough to come, he probably knew enough not to be fooled by the ignorant act, but it couldn't hurt to try.

"Because whatever you and Bruce are fighting about - "

His gut lurched. "Bruce?" he said with forced confusion. "I thought we were talking about Batman."

The kid shook his head impatiently. "I know Bruce is Batman."

Dick had to fight the urge to go for a weapon. "Who did you say you are, kid?"

"Tim. Tim Drake."

Some of the tension went out of him. "Oh. You could have led with that." He wanders over to the fridge. "Want something to drink?" he asked over his shoulder.

Tim actually looked startled, which was only fair, really. "You know about me?"

"Barbara's told me about you." On the rare occasions they still talked. His chest ached at the reminder, but he shoved it down stubbornly. "Coke? Milk? Water?"

"Um, water, please."

"Coming up. Now, what's this about Bruce doing something stupid?"

Whatever answer Tim was going to make was cut off by the shrill ringing of the kitchen phone. It was too loud to easily talk over, but work would have called his cellphone which meant that whatever Tim had to say was more important. Dick impatiently waited it out.

The instant it stopped ringing, Dick's cellphone started up instead. He sighed. "Just a second," he promised Tim, pulling it out to end the call.

When he saw the number, he hesitated. It was from the manor. And if Bruce was about to do something stupid . . . He flashed an apologetic look at Tim and accepted the call. "Alfred?" It had to be Alfred. Bruce hadn't talked to him since - Since.

But it was Bruce's voice that answered. It was frantic in a way Dick had rarely heard it and that scraped at the edges of raw memories. _"Dick, I need help. How soon can you get to Gotham? I can't - Please."_

Dick's eyes, already wide, went even wider. Bruce's panic felt contagious. He grabbed a jacket off the back of the couch. "A couple of hours, max. I can head out the door right now." He gestured for Tim to grab anything he had with him. They could talk in the car. "What's going on?"

" _Tim's gone. His phone's here, I can't track him, he's just_ gone, _Dick - "_

Dick froze on his way out the door. "Tim? As in Tim Drake?"

Tim went very still.

 _"Yes."_ He said it like a confession. _"However angry you are about me letting him get involved - "_

"It's not that," Dick interrupted. "It's just that I've already solved your missing person's case." Tim stared up at him with huge eyes. Dick held out the phone. "Tim, say hi."

"Hi, Bruce," Tim said in a very small voice.

Dick pulled the phone back to his ear. "Tell you what," he said with forced lightness. "Why don't I come down to Gotham anyway? I can drop him off." He hung up before Bruce could gainsay the idea.

It was probably wrong of him, but now that the possibility of going to Gotham had been raised, he had to go. He had to. Had to feel the city again. Had to see the manor.

See Alfred. See Barbara, despite what she must think of him now. See Bruce for as long as he could.

See Jason's grave.

He forced himself to take a deep breath so that he could turn and force a smile at the kid. "So. Want to tell me why you nearly gave Bruce a heart attack?"

Tim winced. "I didn't mean to leave my cellphone. I . . . might have panicked a little when I saw everything on the computer in the Batcave. I was just trying to get to you as soon as possible. I didn't think anyone would notice I was gone."

"Okay." Dick could accept that. "Lesson learned. Never assume Bruce won't notice something." Particularly something like the location of someone he considered his. Particularly after Jason. He clapped a hand on Tim's shoulder. "It'll be alright," he assured him. "He'll yell a bit, but that's just because he's worried."

"i know." The last word turned into a yawn.

Dick's smile turned a little more real. "Am I going to have to carry you down to the car?"

"No!"

"Uh-huh. That might have been more convincing if that wasn't another yawn." He swept Tim up and headed out the door.

"Hey!" Tim seemed more startled than really bothered, though. He was already nestling down into the hold.

"Big brother privilege," Dick said with the ease of long habit. It stung a bit coming out, but it was true enough, wasn't it? Barbara hadn't been totally clear on what the kid's exact status was, but it was evident he'd been spending a lot of time around the manor. If he knew the secret, he was in the family, Dick figured.

Tim stiffened a bit though.

Ah. Maybe Tim's status wasn't exact to him either.

Dick locked the door one handed so he didn't have to set Tim down and then started down the stairs toward the car. "How old are you, anyway?"

"Thirteen."

Dick looked down at him doubtfully. "Are you sure about that?"

 _"Yes."_

"If you say so." Dick kept up a steady stream of mindless chatter until they were safely in the car and away from listening ears. "So. What exactly did you find that made you come running here, and how does it relate to Bruce doing something stupid?"

Tim straightened into alertness immediately. "Right. Dick, you've got to come back."

Dick looked pointedly around at the speeding car.

"No, you have to stay," Tim insisted. "He got more reckless after you left. I tried to step in and help but now that's backfired, so you have to come back."

Dick swallowed guiltily. "I don't think that'll help, Timbird," he said softly. "Bruce isn't going to want me to stick around. I doubt he'd have called me for anything short of your disappearing on him."

Tim stared at him blankly. "Of course he wants you to stick around."

Dick shook his head. "We had a - fight before I left," he said carefully. "Well, a series of fights that led up to the big fight. I thought he was being overprotective. He thought I was being too reckless. I said something - unforgivable."

"He loves you," TIm said with supreme confidence. "He just wants you to come home. Then everything will be okay."

Dick's hands were tight around the steering wheel. "We argued for years about whether I would go out in the suit, you know. He never wanted to train me. Never wanted to train Jason. Well, I told him that if he had, Jason would still be alive. I all but told him Jason's death was his fault, Tim. Trust me. He doesn't want to see me. He hasn't called since I left, and I don't blame him."

Tim's mouth flattened into a stubborn line. "Speaking as someone who's _actually been around him_ for the last few months, I'm pretty sure the reason he didn't call was because he thought you were angry with _him._ " He looked at Dick pleadingly. "Just talk to him. If I'm wrong, then you can leave then. I'll figure something else out."

Dick took one hand off the steering wheel to scrub his face. "Okay." How much harm could it do?

He thought back to what Tim had initially said and frowned. "What did you mean when you said you stepped in to help? And how did it backfire?"

Tim hesitated for just a moment before spilling out a summary of how he'd gotten involved with Batman. He ended it with, "And now he wants to try and get custody, which is a terrible idea, so you have to stop him."

"Custody - Wait, you're not Bruce's biological kid, are you? Does he want to try and get you away from your mom?"

Tim shook his head. "I'm the neighbors' kid. Bruce thinks they're neglectful."

"Are they?" Dick asked carefully.

"They're . . . away a lot," Tim admitted. "But I can take care of myself."

"You just admitted to wandering around Gotham at midnight."

"And I'm okay!"

"Your leg's splinted."

"That was . . . a special case."

"What did they have to say about it?"

"Not much," Tim admitted softly. "But that's not the point."

"I think that's exactly the point," Dick said gently. He pulled the car over to the side of the road so he could turn and look at Tim properly. "If you don't want to stay with Bruce, then we can work something else out, okay? But something has to change."

Tim's eyes looked suspiciously full. Dick pulled him into a hug. Tim stiffened for a moment before melting into it.

"I do want to," he admitted into Dick's shirt, his voice muffled and choked like it was a terrible secret.

Dick rubbed his back soothingly. "Good. It'd be nice to have another little brother. What's the problem, then?"

"He needs a good kid. Someone who can help him. Not someone to drag him into a media circus."

"Hey, let's not insult the good name of the circus," Dick said. "I used to be in one, you know."

"I know." He thought he could feel Tim smiling despite himself. "I saw you. You promised to do your quadruple back-flip for me."

Dick couldn't help it. His mouth dropped open. "You're _that_ Tim?"

"You remember me?" Tim sounded stunned.

Dick remembered just about everything from that night, including the tiny kid that had seemed so lonely and had lit up so much when Dick had given him a hug for the picture. His arms tightened around him now. "I do. See? Obviously you were meant to be part of the family. Don't worry about the media. That's what Bruce has a public relations office for. And lawyers. He has a truly terrifying team of lawyers." Tim was wavering, he could tell. "I'll make you a deal. I'll stick around if you will. Deal?"

" . . . Deal."

* * *

By the time they got back to the manor, Tim was dead to the world. Dick didn't bother to wake him. He just picked him up and carried him to the door. Tim's fingers kind of locked around his shirt, and that made a guilty warmth spread in Dick's chest. He hadn't earned the brightness in Tim's eyes when he looked at him, but he had it, and it made his chest ache a bit less.

Alfred opened the door before he could even knock, and he could see Bruce pacing in the hallway behind him. He stopped as soon as the door opened.

"Dick."

"Bruce." He'd made a promise, but now that he was here, he wasn't really sure how to go about it. "Tim's fine. Where should I set him down?"

"'m awake," Tim mumbled.

"Sure you are, Timmers." Dick stepped into the warmth of the manor.

Alfred shot a pointed look at Bruce. Bruce took the hint.

"He's got a room upstairs. I'll show you."

Dick followed Bruce up the stairs. "He's got a room? I thought you hadn't officially adopted him yet."

Bruce winced like he read an accusation somewhere in there. "I should have told you."

Well, it would have been _nice_ , but Dick wasn't entirely sure who would win the blame game for communication failures here, so he just shrugged and said, "Barbara told me."

They walked in awkward silence for the rest of the way until Bruce opened the door to a room just two doors down from Dick's and one door down from Jason's.

The room looked transitional, caught somewhere between guest room and inhabited. A camera sat on the bedside table, a laptop perched on the desk, and there were hints of other things carefully tucked away, but the room had been kept scrupulously and unnaturally neat.

Dick laid Tim down on the bed and pulled up the throw blanket to cover him. Tim must have finally been fully asleep, because he just snuggled into the bed without protest.

Which just left him, Bruce, and an uncomfortable conversation.

"You thought he'd been kidnapped," Dick said, once he was safely on the other side of the door. He kept his voice low so that it wouldn't wake Tim.

"Yes." Bruce had his defenses up, but even through their careful blankness, he could catch a glimpse of the still fading desperate terror that had brought. "He ran away instead." And that was a whole new type of pain, Dick guessed.

"Not away," Dick corrected. "To. He needed to talk to me face to face, and apparently he thought no one would notice if he was gone for a bit."

Bruce looked like he'd been forced to bite something sour.

"Yeah," Dick agreed. "You're - you're doing the right thing by taking him in, Bruce."

Bruce's shoulders relaxed infinitesimally. "I've been training him," he said, and that ought to be a non sequitur, but -

Dick looked down. "It wasn't your fault. I never should have implied otherwise. I'm _sorry_ , Bruce." He looked back up, his expression pleading like it hadn't been since the very beginning when he'd been apologizing for breaking something ridiculously expensive with his antics.

Not much had changed really.

Bruce was staring at him. Dick didn't think he'd ever seen him so caught off guard before.

Tim had been right. He really - He really wasn't mad.

Dick raised his arms hopefully like he used to for a hug, and Bruce choked out a laugh before grabbing hold of him as tightly as he would if something were trying to snatch him away. Dick clung back.

 _Still here. Still here. Still here._

"I need about a week to wrap things up in Bludhaven. I thought maybe after that I could get them to send someone else. Come home."

Bruce held on tighter.

* * *

The process of getting Tim away from his parents was a long one, even when Dick was ninety-eight percent sure Bruce was pulling strings to get some of the rules bent.

In the meantime, Dick devoted himself to keeping Tim's mind off things.

Today, for instance, he was teaching Tim some of his gymnastics tricks.

Right up until Barbara showed up.

Dick was kind of impressed with how fast the kid managed to slip away.

Unfortunately, that left him alone with a ticked off Barbara. He rubbed the back of his head awkwardly. "Hey."

"Hey," she said coolly. "You're back."

"Yep," he said with forced brightness. He deflated quickly at the look on her face. "Look, I'm sorry I ran off like that. It won't happen again."

"It had better not. Do you have any idea how many times Bruce nearly died out there because he didn't have backup?"

"He had you," Dick protested weakly, but - He had nightmares about that exact scenario. He just tried not to think of it.

"Yes," she hissed. "With my drones, which aren't effective in every situation and which can be knocked down or run out of battery, or be ineffective, and do you know what happened then? I had to go out after him. Only I couldn't get out of the _car,_ because I don't think the Joker would be very intimidated by my wheelchair, so do you know who did?"

The answer hit him like a blow to the gut. "Tim."

"Tim," she agreed. "Tim went face to face with the Joker, and he very nearly succeeded in turning it into a suicide mission."

He could have lost another brother. He could have lost another brother without ever meeting him.

Enough of his horror must have shown on his face for Barbara to soften. "Look. You needed time after Jason. I get that. Just - "

"It won't happen again," he swore, much more firmly this time.

She nodded sharply. "Good."

"So where does that leave us?" he asked softly.

She hesitated. "If you needed to go, you needed to go. I'm just not sure what it says about our relationship that when things got that bad, you felt like you could handle it better without me."

"I didn't want to handle it without you," he said immediately. "It was never about that. It was about Bruce and stupid choices. We've handled hard times together before. We can do it again."

Barbara looked down at the wheelchair. "I guess we have." She sighed. "I don't want us to be over," she admitted. "But let's take it slow, okay?"

"I can do that," he agreed. "Does that mean I get a nice, slow welcome back kiss?"

She laughed. "You're incorrigible."

"That's not a no."

* * *

The night they finally got custody of Tim, Dick didn't really expect to find him out in the family cemetery.

He walked up to where Tim was sitting in front of Jason's grave. "Alfred's got celebratory cookies inside, you know."

Tim looked up, a small smile flashing across his face. "I know. I'll come in just a minute. I just wanted . . . " He struggled for words for a few minutes.

"To let him know?" Dick guessed.

Tim shrugged. A little embarrassed. "To make sure he knew I wasn't trying to replace him."

Dick dropped an arm around his shoulders. "He would have understood," he assured him. "Bruce didn't adopt him to try and replace me. You're not a replacement for him."

Some of the tension bled out of Tim's shoulders.

"Come on," Dick said.

He glanced back at the grave as they walked away.

 _You've got a younger brother now, Jay. You would have loved him._

Something nagged him about the flowers planted over the grave. They looked a little different than he remembered them.

But it was late. The shadows were probably just messing with him.

* * *

When Tim had turned thirteen, his parents had called him a day late to wish him congratulations, and they'd signed off on the additional martial arts classes he'd asked for.

When Tim turned fourteen, Alfred baked him a butterscotch cake and all his favorites for dinner. Dick got him a new camera. Barbara got him a photo album already partially filled with shots of the various vigilantes and villains pulled from surveillance footage around Gotham.

Bruce took him on a trip to Metropolis for a long weekend. He let Tim meet Clark, and he walked the streets with him after dark with the help of a little inside knowledge so that Tim could get some shots of Superman.

(If Bruce felt a little smug satisfaction at the look on Clark's face when Tim figured out his secret identity, then no one had to know.)

(And if he guessed that half the reason Tim valued the trip so much was because what it was, first and foremost, was a gift of time and attention, no one had to know that either.)


	4. Stephanie

"I liked the Cluemaster a lot better back when he actually left clues."

"We all did, Nightwing," Tim said dryly, leaning back in his chair. "On the bright side, if someone had to break out of confinement, at least it was him and not, say, Ivy." _Or Joker._

"Point taken, T." Dick sighed. "Speaking of which, we still need a better code name for you."

"T works fine," he protested. It wasn't the first time he'd made that argument.

"You need a bird name. It's traditional."

"Just because you had one - "

"What, did you think Jay was just a letter? It was short for Bluejay."

Bruce's silence went a little deeper on the comms. Dick rolled forward anyway. Tim was pretty sure he was on a campaign to force Bruce to talk about the good times with Jason instead of just the end.

"So. A bird name."

Tim's name didn't really lend itself to a bird name in his opinion, especially since "Timbirds" weren't an actual thing despite Dick's attempts to convince him otherwise. "Maybe something to do with dragons instead?" he said tentatively. It could be a play off his last name.

Or. Old last name. Something like that.

"There's a thought," Dick said approvingly.

Bruce let out a disapproving grunt. He got touchy sometimes when Tim alluded to his parents. Tim wasn't really sure why.

"Batman - " Barbara said, voice stern with disapproval.

"It's fine," Tim said hurriedly. He racked his brain for other ideas. "I'm kind of bad at naming things," he said apologetically.

"Oh!" Dick said cheerily. "I know! You can have my old name. You've already been Robin once, right?"

"And nearly died."

"You don't have to mention that every time it comes up, Batman," Barbara said. "We all nearly died. We get it."

Tim was still staring at his computer screen in shock.

Be - Robin?

"I'd - I'd like that," he managed to stutter out.

"Great! That's settled then."

Bruce sighed. "The case, however, is not," he pointed out. Tim was pretty sure he was going for stern, but it came out fondly exasperated instead.

"Right," he said. "There's suspicious activity on Fifth Avenue if you want to go check that out. Oracle and I can work on the Cluemaster from here - "

Click.

Tim turned to see Barbara snapping a photo of him.

"What?" she said innocently. "Turnabout's fair play, and _someone_ had to capture that grin on your face.

He blushed, but the grin didn't fade.

"Pictures of the baby Robin!" Dick crowed.

Robin. He was Robin.

He was still grinning as he got back to work.

* * *

"I've got good news and confusing news," Nightwing said. "The good news is that I just found a clue to the Cluemaster's next move."

Bruce swung over an alley towards Nightwing's location. "The confusing news?"

"The confusing news is that it looks a lot less like a clue and a lot more like an anonymous tip. 'Cluemaster's meeting someone in the abandoned pork warehouse tomorrow night.' Unless he's talking about himself in third person now, I'm calling something rotten in the state of Denmark."

"Shakespeare," Oracle said. "I'm impressed. Almost impressed enough to forgive you for that pun earlier."

"It was a good pun!"

"In the same sense that you have a good fashion sense, yes."

"Oracle." Bruce loved his children. He did. He just wished they could stay a bit more focused on patrol.

Or, better yet, not _go_ on patrol.

"Robin's hunting down that warehouse as we speak," Oracle assured him. "I'm trying to get a visual on where our anonymous tip was placed. If I go back a few hours, maybe we can get a good look at who placed it here."

The comms were silent for a few minutes. Then -

"Okay, that's definitely not Cluemaster, but that's about all I can tell from this angle. Let's try - Got it."

There was another long silence.

"Oracle?" Bruce prompted.

"It's a cape," Oracle said reluctantly.

"A new one?" Nightwing asked. Bruce was only a few streets away from him now. "In this city? Are we talking vigilante or villain?"

Oracle hesitated. "It's too soon to be sure on that front. You'll have to be careful of her either way."

"Oh?" Nightwing asked curiously. "She a meta?"

"No. She's a kid."

Robin took umbrage to that. "She looks like she's my age. She's not a kid."

"A _child?"_ Bruce growled.

"Teenager," Robin stressed. "Definitely a teenager." There was a pause where he presumably looked over the security footage. "She's kind of cute."

"Brings back the old days, doesn't it, Batgirl?" Nightwing said delightedly.

"Ah, young love," Oracle said dryly.

"Wait, what? I didn't mean - "

"Description, Oracle," Bruce cut in.

There was a girl running around out there. Defying the Cluemaster. Getting close enough to him to have tips to drop. If she got caught -

The sound of bullets shuddered in his ears and it took him a moment to realize it wasn't in his mind. He changed directions and started running towards them.

Oracle worked as he ran. "Purple spandex outfit. It looks like she sewed it herself. Pretty cool cape with a deep enough hood that I can't see her face. I'm catching some strands of hair though. No color on the surveillance tapes, but they seem pretty light, and they're definitely long. Roughly Robin's height. I can show you a still when you get back to the Cave."

"And I found the warehouse," Robin cut in. "There's a possibility she'll be there tomorrow to see if you took her tip seriously."

Bruce threw himself into the fight he'd found with more force than he'd used since he'd found Tim. "She's our top priority," he ordered.

They'd find her. They had to.

* * *

The purple costume blended into the shadows a lot better than Bruce would have thought.

Just not quite well enough.

He landed silently behind the girl. She was crouched at the edge of the building, peering over it towards the warehouse.

"We've got this. Go home."

She jumped and whirled around. "Batman!"

"Yes. Go home."

She stood and crossed her arms stubbornly. "Not until I know you've got him."

"Do your parents know you're out chasing criminals?"

She laughed bitterly. "My dad _is_ a criminal. He's down in that warehouse right now. The Cluemaster himself. Yay me."

"Cluemaster's civilian identity is Arthur Brown," Oracle said instantly. "Assuming she's telling the truth, that would make her Stephanie Brown."

"Fourteen years old," Robin supplied. "Dad's been in and out of prison most of her life. She'd have good reason to resent him."

"I can try to get records of any communication between them," Oracle said. "In the meantime - "

"Mom's Crystal Brown. Former drug addict, currently working three jobs to keep them afloat." Robin paused. "One of them's a nightshift."

"Mom seems to actually be getting her life on track though, so you can't just adopt this one," Oracle added. "Sorry, Bats."

"We'll just have to get her to marry in," Nightwing said cheerily. "Robin's up for it, right, Robin?"

"I made _one comment -_ "

"Enough!"

The girl tilted her head. "Um. Sorry?"

He sighed. "Not you. Certain vigilantes need to learn a lesson about radio silence."

"Ooooh. There really are a whole herd of you. Herd? Flock? Terror? What's the right word for a collective of vigilantes?"

"A justice," Bruce said dryly. "And I appreciate the tip, but it's too dangerous for you to out here, Stephanie."

Stephanie stuttered back a step. Dangerous, as close as she was to the edge. He started edging closer to her, so he could grab her if it came to that. "Stephanie? Who's Stephanie? I'm Spoiler."

"Like she's spoiling her father's plans or like in movie reviews when they warn you when there's a spoiler coming up?" Nightwing wondered.

Why. Just - Why.

"Do you even have any armor in that suit?" he demanded.

She folded her arms across her chest defensively. "Hey, I did the best I could. It's not like I had a big budget to work with here."

The latest version of the cape was bulletproof. He undid the clasp and handed it over. "Here. Wear this tonight if you're going to stay to see it through. emStay here./em"

She brightened immediately. "Cool! Does this mean I get to work with you now?"

He pulled a comm out of one of his pouches and handed it over. "It means that next time something like this happens, you'll call us instead."

Her shoulders caved in a bit. "Oh."

He reached out and squeezed her shoulders. "You've been incredibly brave," he told her. "To stand up to your father. To come out here. But there's a better option now."

"Okay." She nodded firmly. "If my dad breaks out again once you've caught him, I'll track him down and tell you everything you need to know."

"You'll stay safe for your mom and hope your father doesn't contact you," he corrected. "The second he does, or the second you think he's getting someone else to, or you start to feel unsafe, you call us."

"I can help," she said in a small voice.

"You have helped. Now you can be safe."

* * *

Stephanie flopped back onto her bed and stuck the stupid comm thing in her ear. "Does this thing even work, or was Bats just trying to get rid of me?"

"It works," a cheery voice said from the other side.

She jumped and let out a small shriek. She quickly clapped a hand over her mouth. "Sorry. Um, who is this?"

"Your friendly neighborhood Robin. Nice to meet you, Spoiler."

"Robin? Really?" She pictured the athletic guy they'd all seen flipping over the streets a year or so back. "I always thought your voice would be deeper."

Robin cleared his throat. "Oh. Uh, you're thinking of the old Robin. He's Nightwing now. He let me have the title."

"Huh. Cool." She thought about that for a minute. "How'd you get the job?" Maybe she could take the title when the current Robin was done with it.

"I figured out Batman's secret identity and stalked him all over the city." She could hear keys tapping from the other side. "I don't necessarily recommend it. There were a couple of near death experiences involved."

"Still. He lets _you_ help," she grumbled.

"From the safety of home base," he corrected. "No capes till we're eighteen. That's the rule."

She sat up. "Wait. You're a teenager? Am I older than you? I bet I'm older than you."

"I'll have you know that I'm far older than you."

She let her skeptical silence speak for itself.

" . . . By two months. Anyway, home base is different. It's safe."

"Nowhere's safe." She'd learned that lesson a long time ago.

"Please don't tell Batman that."

* * *

"So, since Batman couldn't track my dad down the _first time_ I gave him a perfectly good tip - "

"In all fairness, he probably would have if he hadn't been trying to keep an eye on you."

"His overprotective smothering instincts are not my fault. _Anyway,_ since he failed to give him the beatdown he so richly deserves, I have dug up more info for you."

"Safely?"

She popped her gum as she considered that question. Her leg had mostly stopped bleeding. "Sure. Let's tell Bats that."

Robin groaned. "Spoiler. He will padlock your window. You think I'm exaggerating, but I'm not. I'm really not."

She snorted. "Robin, my apartment walls are so thin that if he sealed the whole place up, I could tunnel out in two minutes and tell my mom it was rats."

Robin considered this for a minute. "I don't think ratholes are quite that large."

"Mutant rats," she corrected. "It's Gotham. She'll buy it."

Robin sighed. "The worried eyebrows of doom are going to come out. Why would you force me to watch the worried eyebrows of doom?" Something clinked on the other side. Sounded like a mug.

"Robin, that had better not be coffee," she heard a warning growl say through the comm.

"Uh-oh. Gotta go."

* * *

"Guess who just broke out of Blackgate?"

"Given who's calling, I'm going to guess Cluemaster."

She gasped. "You figured out my diabolical clues! Whatever shall I do?"

Robin laughed. "We're on it."

* * *

Stephanie swung through her window. It had been a long day. Her news wasn't urgent; she could wait and call it into Robin in the morning. Right now, all she wanted to do was go to bed.

The shadows moved.

She grabbed the nearest thing that came to hand - her math textbook - and hurled it at the shape. It hit with a solid thunk.

Her eyes adjusted to the light in the room. She gulped. "Oops. Sorry, Bats."

"You went out."

"Now you sound like my father," she grumbled. "Or. You know. What I presume my father would sound like if he wasn't too busy fighting in gang wars to actually do his job."

He sighed. Batman seemed to do that a lot when she was around. "I just don't want you to get hurt."

She waved him off. "I know, I know."

"I don't think you do." Batman was suddenly very, very close, and he had a hand on each shoulder. It would have been kind of intimidating if he hadn't crouched down so that he was actually a little shorter than her. "I've lost a child, Stephanie. Trust me when I tell you that nothing hurts worse. Whatever you think of your father, you can't do that to your mother."

She opened her mouth to argue and then snapped it closed. "I have to do _something,"_ she finally said. "And it's not like Dad just calls me up and tells me what crime he's going to commit today."

Batman pinched the bridge of his nose. "What if we could find you something else to do? Something that didn't involve your father?"

She considered that for a moment, then shrugged. "I'm up for it." As long as they still caught her father, she was okay working another angle. Her eyes widened. "Ooh. Is this a Cave job? Do I finally get to see the Cave? Do I get to meet the others?"

"Yes."

"To which?"

"Yes."

* * *

Oracle spun her wheelchair away from the computer to face her. "Okay. You've got three options here. Option one, I can teach you how to work my computer magic, and you can join Robin and I on the comms."

Robin waved at her cheerfully from his spot beside Oracle. Both of them were wearing domino masks which looked distinctly odd since the rest of their outfits wouldn't have looked out of place at the mall.

"Option two, we can train you on the equipment. That means keeping inventory, repairing whatever can be repaired, and yelling at the dynamic duo whenever they lose too many batarangs."

Stephanie looked around at the vast Cave. That was a _lot_ of inventory.

"Option three, we can start training you for basic first aid. Right now we've got Agent A doing the basics and Dr. Thompkins taking care of anything more drastic. Agent A's got a full plate, though, so having someone to take over would be good."

"What qualifies as basic first aid?"

"Keeping track of the first aid supplies and handing it over when it's something they can handle themselves. Bandaging them up when they can't. Checking them for basic symptoms of concussion. Injecting them with pre-filled syringes of antidote to the various venoms. Eventually, we'd work our way up to stitches, CPR, and filling the syringes yourself."

"Badgering them to get checked over," Robin put in. "Yelling at B to take his pain pills. Glaring disapprovingly when he's on his fifth cup of coffee."

"Stealing Robin's cup when it's got _any_ coffee," Oracle said, swiping Robin's thermos as she did so.

"That was water!"

Oracle unscrewed the lid and dumped the liquid into her own empty cup. A long stream of brown liquid poured out. "I know for a fact we can afford cleaner water than this, kid." She took a long drink. "My coffee intake, on the other hand, is not up for debate."

Stephanie couldn't help but grin at their antics. This was exactly what she'd been hoping this would be.

Robin was still scowling at Oracle, but he turned back to Stephanie. "So. Options."

She considered them. She'd originally assumed she'd be helping out on the computers, but now that she knew there were other options, she wasn't so sure. They already had two people on the computers and they were doing fine. She didn't want just a pity job. Besides, computers weren't really her thing.

Inventory was important, but it sounded a bit like picking up after everyone else, and she wasn't about to get sucked into that.

So . . . medicine. Like her mom. That would definitely be helpful.

"First aid," she said decidedly. "I want to do that."

Oracle grinned. "Excellent. Nightwing and I will get you to and from every night. What nights can you come early from combat training?"

Stephanie brightened. "Combat training?"

"You're not the only one not one hundred percent sure the Cave's totally safe," Robin told her. "B wants us to be prepared."

She grinned. "Awesome."

* * *

"Bandages?"

"Third drawer down."

"Antidote to Joker gas?"

"Two drawers down to the right."

"Antidote to fear gas?"

"Two drawers down to the left."

"Excellent. Now let's see how your stitches are coming along."

* * *

Batman considered her across the training mat. "What do you already know about fighting?"

"Hit hard, fight dirty, stay alive."

Batman's mouth twitched. "Good. Now we just have to teach you how to hit smarter."

* * *

She wasn't supposed to actually stitch anybody up for ages yet, but Agent A was busy on Batman and Dr. Thompkins was elbow deep in surgery down at her own clinic. She might have at least asked one of the others to supervise, but they were frantically trying to break down the latest fear gas that Batman had been hit with.

She took a deep breath and threaded her needle. She'd already cleaned the area. Now she just had to stitch it up.

She grabbed the cloth doll she'd been working with before things had gone bad and shoved it at Nightwing. "Here. Squeeze this if it hurts too bad."

He grinned at it. "Cool." He held his other arm steady as she took another deep breath and went to work on it. The hand that was holding the doll fingered the awkward stitching that covered the doll's thick cloth skin. "What is this?"

"It's my stitching baby. I've been practicing on it."

Nightwing looked down at the jagged stitches. "Oh." He seemed a little less enthusiastic.

Stephanie finished off the stitches and tied it off. "Stop whining, you big baby." She looked over at the doll. "That's my old one anyway." She scanned the counter and grabbed the newer one. "This is the one I used tonight." The stitches were a lot better on that one.

Nightwing brightened again. "Nice. You've made a lot of progress." He twisted his arm to get a look at it and poked at the stitches.

She smacked his hand. "Bad birdie."

* * *

Dr. Thompkins tapped her fingers on the clinic office's overburdened desk. "You realize that I can't just give you a crash course to surgery."

"I don't want you to," Stephanie said promptly. "I just want to help out around the clinic and maybe pick up some warning signs of when things are really bad, so I have a better idea of when to call you."

Dr. Thompkins sighed. "I've been needing a volunteer to run the front desk," she admitted. "If you can do that for a few hours a week, then I can spare you some time to teach you a few things. This will _not_ replace having an actual professional on hand," she warned.

Stephanie nodded. "Got it."

* * *

 **Spoiler's Guide to Bats, Birds, and Coffee**

 **1\. Batman can have four cups without comment. On the fifth cup, start glaring. On the sixth cup, start mournfully talking about what a bad example he's being. By the seventh cup, Agent A will have switched it to decaf.**

 **2\. Nightwing can be trusted to control his own caffeine intake. It's his sugar intake that can't be trusted. When he starts getting extra bouncy, hide the candy. And the cookies. And the sugar packets.**

 **3\. Technically, Robin's not supposed to have any coffee. Hypothetically, though, a cup or two might be a good bribe and might get him to smile that stupid little grin of his. Strictly hypothetically.**

 **4\. Oracle gets as much coffee as she wants. How much of that is decaf is up to Agent A.**

 **5\. Agent A doesn't drink coffee. He drinks tea. And possibly some sort of super solider serum, but I haven't been able to find it yet.**

 **6\. If Mom asks, I don't drink coffee. If any of the Bats ask who just stole theirs, I _definitely_ don't drink coffee.**

 **Besides, I'm the medic. It's not stealing. It's confiscation.**

* * *

Technically, Stephanie didn't have to have a comm as it wasn't like she had any information to share with the patrol, but she liked having one, and it let her have a better idea of just how many bandages she'd be needing that night.

Which was why she got a front row suit to Nightwing saying, "Eew. It's all over me."

"Nightwing, report," Batman said tightly.

"Nothing dangerous," Nightwing assured everyone. "Just blood."

"You get blood all over you ever night," Oracle pointed out dryly.

"Yeah, but they don't usually _cough_ it on me."

Stephanie screwed up her face. "Ew," she agreed.

Robin looked concerned. "Did any actually touch your skin? If they're that sick - "

"I don't think so," Nightwing said, sounding a little uneasy. "And I mean, it might not even be contagious, right, Spoiler?"

She shrugged helplessly even knowing he couldn't see it. "This wasn't exactly in Vigilante Care 101. A shower probably couldn't hurt, though."

"Nightwing, tie up the perp and head on back to the Cave. You're cutting patrol short tonight," Batman ordered.

"Normally I'd argue with you, but this guy looks terrible. Might be better to cut this off at the pass," Nightwing agreed. "I'll be at the Cave in ten."

"If we're careful cleaning it up, hopefully that'll be the end of it," Oracle said.

"Will you kiss me to make it better just in case?"

"I'm not touching you till we know we're not about to reenact Masque of the Red Death."

Stephanie didn't have to see Dick to know he was pouting.

* * *

"So I talked to Dr. Thompkins about blood guy." Stephanie said as soon as she got out of the car and into the Cave.

All eyes turned to her. "Yeah?" Nightwing said with strained nonchalance.

"It could be a lot of things," she hedged. "Could even just be that he'd coughed so much that his threat was raw. But. But she's been seeing this some the past few days."

Batman's gauntlets clenched around the back of his chair. "And how bad is 'this?'"

 _Not good_ was the truthful answer. "No one's died yet?" That they knew of, at least.

"Well, that's something," Nightwing said optimistically. "Any way to check to see if I've got it?"

She brightened. "That's the good news. Dr. Thompkins said one of her nurses caught it from a patient and had a rash on her arms within twenty-four hours. So if you don't have one yet, we should be good."

Nightwing was still in civilian clothes, so he rolled his sleeves up easily enough. "We're good."

"Yes!" Stephanie held her hand out for a fist bump. Nightwing obliged her, grinning. Most of the built-up tension leaked out of the Cave.

Even Batman looked relieved, but that didn't stop him from adding a cautionary note to the celebratory atmosphere. "If this is natural, then it's out of our hands. Just in case something got past us, though, I want either Oracle or Robin to take a look at it."

"On it, B," Robin assured him.

Batman swept his gaze over everyone in the room. "Whether or not it's natural, I want everyone to be careful. Particularly you, Spoiler, since you'll be more exposed at the clinic."

"Sir, yes, sir!" she said, snapping off a sloppy salute.

Batman just nodded. "Then let's get to work."

* * *

"Robin. Robin. Come in, Robin," Stephanie hissed under her breath. She was leaning against the furthest corner of the last bathroom stall, but it still wasn't exactly ideal privacy.

"Spoiler." Robin's surprised voice finally came through. She sagged in relief. "You're lucky I was down here tracking down possible contaminants. What's up?"

"Yeah, about that. How's the search going?"

He sounded grim. "I wasn't going to bring this up until we were all together tonight, but . . . Yeah. I think something got past us. The spread pattern is far too controlled to be natural. Why? What's happening at the clinic?"

"A lot more cases for one thing. For another - Look, it's not everybody, not by a long shot, but I just overheard a bunch of patients comparing notes over these weird batarangs they'd found lately."

"You think maybe Nightwing got it after all and has been acting as a carrier? Except no, then we'd have it by now, and you said the batarangs were weird. Weird how?"

"Apparently when they went to pick them up, they lit up on contact. It wouldn't work if they were wearing gloves, just human contact. They thought maybe Batman was experimenting with something new."

"Traps," Robin breathed. "People trust Batman. They like to collect the batarangs. They assume they're safe. So maybe they manufacture their own batarangs, maybe they're just a dedicated collector, but they get a bunch together, contaminate them somehow . . . " She could hear papers rustling. "The disease hasn't spread exactly along our patrol routes, but it's close enough that I can believe that's what someone's going for. Maybe they just wanted to make it easy to believe there'd be a beatarang there, maybe they're hoping someone else makes the connection and pins this on Batman."

"Or maybe they're just trying to activate his guilt complex," she pointed out.

"Or that," he admitted. "Regardless, this at least gives us something. We can have Commissioner Gordon issue a warning not to touch them and to call the authorities if one's spotted, and we'll be more careful with ours to avoid confusion. Unfortunately, the disease has probably spread far enough on it's own by now that it can go under its own steam, but . . . "

"But we can at least slow it down," she agreed. "Good work, partner."

She could practically hear his grin. "Good work."

* * *

Warning issued to all necessary parties, Stephanie was feeling a lot better about the situation. Her mom might be working a few more shifts at the hospital, but this would all blow over soon.

Right up until -

"Dr. Thompkins?" The doctor didn't usually call her.

"Stephanie." She sounded strained. "I don't want you coming in for the next little bit."

She felt like she'd been punched. "What did I do?"

"It's not that." There was a long hesitation. "Stephanie, we haven't come up with anything to fight this yet. And we've had our first fatality."

* * *

"At least the streets have been quieter," Tim offered as small consolation. They'd been quiet enough that he'd decided to temporarily leave the cameras to Oracle so he could work on packing the extra batarangs away. It had been decided that Batman and Nightwing would each only carry one while the crisis continued.

He had to admit, if only to himself, that just touching these gave him a faint sense of unease. They were safe, of course, the ones he was working with were the ones that had been kept safely in their belt pouches until now, but -

The batarang he was packing away was suddenly very warm in his hand.

He looked down.

It was glowing.

"Oracle," he said, very calmly. His hands were shaking. "Activate the quarantine protocols. Now."

* * *

Barbara slammed in the codes without question. The doors to the house were blocked off by steel slamming into the ground, cutting Alfred safely out. The doors that let the batmobile in slammed down next. Bruce and Dick were safely out of it.

Tim was already heading for the decontamination shower, she saw out of the corner of her eyes. The batarang had been triple bagged and sealed.

Stephanie tossed her an air filter mask. She was already wearing her own. Barbara slid it on. Even with all the work being done on it, it still wasn't clear what transmitted the disease other than the batarangs. Better safe than sorry.

"Oracle," Bruce growled in her ear. "Did I hear that right?"

"Quarantine procedures," she repeated. Her voice only shook a little. "A rogue batarang got into the Cave somehow. It's been sealed off. You'll have to hide the batmobile elsewhere on the grounds. I'll begin looking at alternate locations."

"Negative. I'm coming back."

"No," she snapped. "The city needs Batman out there finding who did this, so we can find a cure. _We_ need you out there."

"Who activated it?" Dick asked. His voice was uncharacteristically small.

There was no good answer to that question, but they deserved to know. "Robin," she said gently.

There was a long, trembling silence filled with an old terror.

"Find the person who did this," she pressed. "It's the best way you can help now."

* * *

Stephanie shakily sorted through the medicines they had available. Anti-itch cream - that might be useful once the rash showed up. Fever reducers, they would need those.

There wasn't any cough medicine. No one would have thought they would need it down here. There weren't any prescription drugs either. Dr. Thompkins kept a tight grip on those.

Stephanie pulled out a pain reliever with trembling fingers. The pills rattled together in the bottle.

"Hey." Oracle touched her arm, careful to keep clothing between them. Just in case. "It's going to be okay."

"That's what my mom had said the first time my dad went to jail."

"And now you're with us and things are okay," Oracle said firmly. "Now. What do you want to tell your mom?"

Stephanie took a shaky breath. "I've been telling her that I've been spending my evenings volunteering. I'll just tell her there was an outbreak at the volunteer center, and that I'm fine, but they won't let me come home just yet." It was as close to the truth as she could get.

Oracle squeezed her arm gently. "Good. Go ahead and call her. I'll go talk to Robin."

* * *

"Robin. Status report."

Tim almost laughed at the tense order. It seemed out of place in the daylight hours. "So far, so good. Maybe we got lucky."

"Maybe."

An hour later, on the dot: "Status report?"

If Tim didn't know better, he might think that Bruce had a timer going, either to remind him to call or to keep him from calling every five minutes.

Then again, this was Bruce.

* * *

He made it almost the full twenty-four hours without the rash.

On the twenty-second hour, the red, raised bumps appeared all along his arms.

Tim stared at the curtains that sectioned off the medbay in the Cave for a long moment.

How could he have been so stupid? He should have been wearing gloves, he should have -

But someone would have touched it eventually. After they thought the danger had passed, someone would have touched it. Better that it was him.

* * *

"Hey, little wing. B told me the news. You okay?"

Tim fiddled with the laptop he'd been given in an effort to resist the temptation to scratch his arms raw. "I'll live," he said wryly.

"Yes," Dick said with more force than Tim was really prepared for. "You will."

* * *

Stephanie sat a careful three feet away from Robin at his insistence despite the gloves, long sleeves, and air filters they were both wearing. She'd brought him a water bottle and a collection of protein bars to eat once she left, as well as a fever reducer that sat innocently on top of the bottle.

According to the thermometer, he only had a borderline fever.

According to what Dr. Thompkins had told her just last night, it wouldn't stay that way for long.

She had one last gift with her. She dug the comm out of her pocket. "Batman wants you to put this back in." It came out muffled through the mask.

Robin just nodded.

* * *

"You know, I took the comm out for a reason, B."

"And that reason was?"

"I - " Tim stalled desperately as he sought for some way deflect the truth.

"Tim."

That Bruce, _Bruce_ , would be the one to break comm regulation shocked the truth out of him. "I'm scared." He couldn't read the silence on the other end of the comm. "I didn't want you to know." Bruce faced down death every night. How could he admit to being scared?

The silence stretched on and on until Bruce finally admitted, "You're not the only one."

* * *

At night, Oracle still did her job. Right now, Stephanie wasn't sure exactly what she was doing. The hours of surveillance footage should have been fairly self-explanatory, but she couldn't figure out what case they were for.

"They wouldn't have just picked up a random batarang," Oracle said quietly from beside her. "Not right now. If someone performed a switch or even planted it on them, they must have gotten close. So far, every time we've managed to get video of someone planting one of these, it's been a flunky who didn't know anything. I'm hoping that for a job this big, the boss did it themselves."

"Makes sense," she agreed. "So you're following footage of Batman and Nightwing through the city. Can I help?"

"Have a seat." Oracle gestured to a chair. "This could take a while. I've got Robin working off a spare computer."

Stephanie remembered his flushed complexion and winced. "Are you sure he'll catch the switch?"

"Maybe not," she admitted. "Which is why I've just got him double checking my own findings."

* * *

"They've got me doing busy work, Nightwing," Tim said crankily. " _Busy work._ I'm the one who's dying. I think I should be allowed to help."

"You're not dying," Dick said automatically. "And it could be worse! The first time I got a cold after putting on the costume, B grounded me for a whole week. _A week."_

"You snuck out, didn't you."

"I absolutely snuck out. B caught me almost immediately. So I was grounded for another week."

"Did you stay in that time?"

"As far as B can prove, yes."

* * *

Oracle kept a feed running of any news of the disease.

Most of it just came down to "fatalities mounting."

* * *

"B? How long has it been?"

"Just a couple of days." Bruce's voice was hoarse. Tim thought he'd probably been using the Batman voice too much. Or he hadn't been sleeping enough. Or both.

He was too tired to filter well. "I miss you."

"I'll see you soon," Bruce promised. "We'll figure it out, I promise."

Tim considered that. Logically, he knew there was only so much even Bruce could do. Childishly, though, some part of him felt better. "I miss real food too," he added after a moment.

Bruce managed a small chuckle. "Just a little longer. Then Agent A will cook you whatever you want."

Just a little longer. Tim swallowed the urge to cough.

* * *

On the bright side, there was plenty of food.

On the downside, that food was water, coffee, and protein bars.

On the real downside, Robin was coughing into his mask. "Still clean," he reported to her with a smile. "No blood."

His eyes were bright with fever.

Stephanie was wrapped in enough protective gear for three teenagers. She gave in and wrapped him in a hug.

He stiffened for a moment but melted into it after a moment. "I'm okay," he promised.

She forced back a sniffle. "No, you're not. But you will be."

"Okay," he agreed.

She didn't trust that answer either.

* * *

Tim hadn't realized before that Dick could sing.

He couldn't quite catch the words just now, but that was alright. The song slid in and out of his dreams of a whole city of empty, echoing houses. It wasn't so lonely with the music there.

* * *

Nightwing's jokes sounded like they hurt as much coming up as the coughs of the afflicted did once they started coughing up blood.

Batman didn't talk much. When he did, it just hurt, period.

* * *

The pills were working for the moment. Tim could finally string two thoughts together.

"B?"

"Yes?" Batman was breathing hard which probably meant that he'd just been a fight. Tim was tempted to wait, but he wasn't sure how long this clear stretch would last and this was important.

"If I die, will you adopt Spoiler?"

"T-Robin." Bruce corrected himself at the last moment. His voice was strained. "You're not going to die."

"But if I do," Tim persisted. "Not even now, necessarily. Just in general."

"Spoiler still has a mother," Bruce pointed out. He still sounded very strained.

"Oh." Tim frowned. He'd been too caught up in the brilliance of the idea to remember that. "That's true. Maybe she knows someone you could adopt."

"Robin."

"I just don't want you to be lonely, B," he mumbled. He could feel his thoughts slipping away again. "It's not good for you to be lonely. Not good for G'tham." He yawned. "Get a girl this time," he managed to get out. "The girls have better luck." Then he was out.

* * *

"Got it," Oracle hissed in triumph. "Batman, I've got footage of a woman planting the batarang. I'm sending a still to Commissioner Gordon. Check in with him to get it. She doesn't look like the other thugs, B. I think this might be it." She scratched absently at her arms as she talked.

"Yes!" Stephanie shouted, punching the air. She turned to congratulate Oracle only to see her dragging the footage into a locked file. "Oracle?"

"I've already sent the still," Oracle said. She must have seen the confusion on Stephanie's face because she tapped her comm to keep herself from transmitting.

Stephanie followed her lead. "What happened?"

Oracle sighed. "He got knocked out. It didn't last for more than a minute, but it was enough time to plant the trap. She even switched out the batarangs so that he had the same number as before. Clever."

Stephanie nodded. "Wait. Which he?" That description could fit either of them depending on the night it had happened.

Oracle looked fiercer than Stephanie had ever seen her. "Some things," she said, "no one needs to know."

"Especially them?"

"Especially them." She rubbed at her arms again then caught herself and looked down. Slowly, she rolled her sleeves up.

Red bumps dotted the skin.

* * *

"Oracle?" Dick's voice was frantic.

"Right here," she assured him. She'd just finished slathering cream on her arms and was about to head back to her desk. At this point, there wasn't much reason not to.

She'd also just finished reporting in to B.

"B said - "

"I know. I'm okay for now."

Dick let out a strangled little half sob. "We'll get her," he swore. "You're going to be fine."

"I know," she said with false confidence.

Dick made that little choking noise again. Barbara had to bite her lip from crying out too. "I miss you like crazy," he whispered.

"Then let's get to work, and we can see each other soon."

* * *

Oracle was fading a lot faster than Robin was. Stephanie wasn't sure why. She just knew she couldn't stop it.

She pushed another bottle of water at Oracle as the older woman finished her coughing fit.

"I'm fine," Oracle gasped into the comm. "Fine. Progress?"

Batman's voice was full of dark triumph. "We've got her."

Stephanie slumped into her chair in relief. "And once she talks, we're golden. I'm going to go tell Robin."

"I heard," he said in little coughing starts.

"It's going to be okay," Nightwing said. He sounded heady with relief. Stephanie didn't blame him. It was going to be okay.

* * *

"She won't talk."

Oracle closed her eyes. "I was - " She broke off to cough. "Afraid of that."

"The police are working on her records."

Barbara pulled herself up determinedly. "And so am I. Just tell me where to start." Another coughing fit had her hunched over, but she wheeled herself determinedly forward.

"It's going to be okay," Bruce promised her. She wondered how many times he'd said that over the last few days. To Tim. To civilians. To the police.

She wanted something else. Just - just in case. "You still regret me putting on the mask, B?"

"Every day," he said instantly, his roughened voice making the growl even harsher than usual. Then he sighed. "But I wouldn't be here to do it if you hadn't."

She smiled. "Thanks, B." She leaned over her computer and wiped a fleck of blood from her mouth.

* * *

Stephanie was having a recurring nightmare of being stuck down here in the Cave. In the dream, she was in a small clear circle of space. Surrounding the space was a mountain of protein bars.

Also in the space were two bodies, mouths covered in blood.

She never got sick in the dream.

When she woke up from it again, she shoved herself off the spot on the training mat she'd been curled up on and padded over to the bed where Robin slept.

He'd taken off his air filter. She could instantly see why. The once pristine interior was tacky with blood.

He'd taken off his other mask too. The black domino was still glistening with sweat on the bedside table.

She stared at it for a long moment before her eyes flickered guiltily to his face.

It was - familiar. She just couldn't quite place it.

His eyes slowly blinked open, and she jumped guiltily. "Hey."

"Hey." His voice was so quiet she could barely hear it. His eyes flicked to the side table, and he smiled up at her ruefully. "Nice to finally meet you, Stephanie. I'm Tim."

Tim. Tim - Drake.

Why hadn't anyone called Bruce Wayne to make excuses for his son? The man must be tearing up the city by now -

Oh.

Oh!

"I think I need to sit down," she said weakly. Since there wasn't a chair handy, she just plopped onto the floor.

"That's what I did when I figured it out," he whispered. "I had to sit down on a gargoyle though."

Stephanie let out a long, incredulous laugh that sounded just faintly hysterical. She just barely managed to pull herself back together. "Do you need anything?" It wasn't time for more of his pills yet. She might could pull something together to soothe his throat, though.

He shook his head weakly. "Got something for you, though. If you - " He started coughing again, loud, hacking coughs that sounded like they would rip straight through his chest.

She leaped to her feet and ran over to him, lifting him up so that he could breathe.

"Thanks," he breathed. "Got something if you want it."

"Oh?" She was pretty sure he was delirious. Had his ice packs thawed already? Maybe she should run and get him fresh ice packs to bring the fever down.

"Robin."

"Yes, I know. You're Robin. You are the immortal Robin, who can never, ever die."

"Robin can't die," he agreed. "So. You. Robin. If you want. If I - " He tried to wave his hand but it just flopped back down.

"I'll go get you fresh ice," she whispered through the tight knot in her throat.

Ice. He just needed more ice.

* * *

"B?"

"Right here, Tim. Try not to talk too much. I don't want you to rip up your throat anymore."

Tim swallowed. It hurt. "I'm not sorry."

"You've done nothing to be sorry for."

"Not sorry - for any of it. Best year of my life." Bruce needed to know that. It was important that he know that.

"You'll have better."

"Best," he repeated. "You were - " He waited for the coughing fit to pass and started again. "Best thing to ever happen to me."

"Tim. Tim!"

Tim was tired.

* * *

She couldn't get the fever to go down. For either of them.

Oracle - no, Barbara, she had overheard Nightwing calling her Barbara - was slumped over the computer, shivering. Her eyes were closed.

Stephanie draped a blanket around her and hoped it was the right thing to do.

She'd taken out her own comm so she could snatch an hour of sleep. She put it back in now.

"Oracle? Oracle!" An unfamiliar voice filled the comm.

"Who is this?" she demanded.

"Commissioner Gordon," the voice answered. "Who is _this_?"

She looked at the screen Oracle had been working on. The police had surrounded a building. The inside cameras revealed it to be a lab.

"B?" she double checked.

"We're working with him on this one," his tense growl confirmed.

And he wanted to give Gordon a chance to talk to Oracle, she realized. Just in case. If the cure wasn't in there . . .

"Who is this?" Gordon repeated. "Where's Oracle?"

She swallowed hard. "Oracle's exhaustion finally caught up to her," she half-lied. "I'm - " Spoiler would mean nothing to him. Tim's words from a few months ago filled her head. "I'll be your friendly neighborhood Robin this evening, and I'll be running the cameras."

* * *

Stephanie had wheeled Barbara into Tim's little enclosure and then collapsed at the foot of Tim's bed into an exhausted puddle. She'd managed to find the strength to drag herself up and check on both of them before promptly collapsing again.

She woke up to a needle pushing into her arm and reacted just the way she'd been taught: with violence.

Her hand hit Batman's mask, and she froze. "Sorry."

"It's alright." He rolled her sleeve back down and carefully tucked away the empty syringe.

She pushed herself up and looked around. "Where's Barbara? How's Tim?"

He froze for a moment when he realized she knew, but it didn't stop him from offering her a hand up. "They're fine," he promised. "Or they will be. They both got the cure in time. It's being passed all around Gotham now, along with a vaccine."

"Good," she breathed. "That's good." She frowned. "Why'd you inject me?"

"Have you looked at your arms recently?"

Stephanie looked down. "Oh." A grin tugged at her lips. "I got sick!"

"You seem surprisingly happy about that."

She flushed. "I had - nightmares. About - not."

He reached out and squeezed her shoulder. "I understand." He paused. "You did well, Stephanie."

"Thanks."

"No." He reached up and pulled his mask off for the first time. His eyes were deadly serious. "You kept them alive until help could come. You handled the cameras when Barbara couldn't. You helped get them the cure. _Thank you."_

She blinked at how much emotion had spilled into his voice. Then she blinked again because her eyes were suddenly watering and everything was pouring down on her at once.

Without quite meaning to, she flung herself at him. His arms wrapped around her automatically, and she hid her face against the bat symbol. "Sorry," she choked out.

"It's okay. We're going to be okay."

This time, she believed him. "Okay," she breathed out. "Okay." She wiped her eyes as best she could. "I want to go see Tim."

"He's still out," he warned, but he sounded just as eager to go as she did.

* * *

Stephanie wasn't there when Tim first woke up. She'd left after a few hours to go reassure her mom.

He was still in the hospital bed when she came back, but the room was empty, so she figured it was safe to talk.

Well. Empty except for Bruce, who was asleep in the visitor's chair. From what she had heard, he and Dick had pretty much just been trading rooms since Tim and Barbara had been checked in. Stephanie's case had been caught soon enough that she didn't have to be.

She sat on the edge of the bed. "You awake?" she whispered.

"Yep," he breathed back. "And alive."

"Yeah, about that." She punched him in the shoulder. Carefully. Gently. More of a tap, really. "I don't care how close you are to death's door, I am never being Robin again. That was terrifying."

"I don't think that was the name's fault," Tim pointed out.

"Don't care. You're stuck with it, and since Robin can't die, that means you're stuck with us."

"That's faulty logic," he said, but he was smiling.

"Still don't care." She looked down at their hands. They were very close to each other. "Also, after all those protein bars I ate, you owe me ice cream. Like, good ice cream. Rich people ice cream."

"Okay," he agreed. "I might even owe you more than one."

"Well, I wouldn't want to get greedy . . . but yes. You're absolutely right."

"It's a date."

* * *

 **A/N: Next up, the chapter we've all been waiting for.**


	5. Jason (Reprise)

**A/N: Okay, there have been some questions about this, so here's the timeline:**

 **Jason dies at 15. Tim is 13 at the time. Within six months, Tim has started to be drawn into the bat family's lives. Right before Tim turns fourteen, Jason comes back from the dead.**

 **This chapter begins at that point. Stephanie's chapter runs parallel to the early stages of this one. By the end of this chapter, Tim will be fifteen.**

 **Jason's age is . . . a little more complicated. By the end of the chapter, he will have been born 17 years ago. Developmentally, though, he's not quite done with 16 yet. For simplicity's sake, he will be referred to as 17, although various characters may dispute the point in the future.**

 **Normally I wouldn't bother so much with the timeline, but since age is such a crucial part of this fic, I wanted to clarify.**

* * *

Ra's was growing impatient with her Beloved.

Talia had done her best to convince him to have patience, that her Beloved would eventually realize his proper place was as Ra's heir, but she feared her efforts would not hold much longer.

Which would be less of a problem if her Beloved was less _stubborn._ He repeatedly refused to return with her, and she was increasingly afraid that she would have to reveal the child's existence to him to gain any leverage at all.

She . . . did not want to do that. If her Beloved knew of Damian, he would want him, she was certain. And who could blame him? Damian would grow to be a fine heir. But she didn't want to have to give Damian up. They should be together, as families always should. If she couldn't make her Beloved see that before he did something drastic . . .

She had been tempted, when she learned of Jason's death, to restore him with the Lazarus Pit and to use that as a leverage. Unfortunately, her Beloved had guarded his son's body well, and she'd had no opportunity to take it before the ideal window closed.

She'd left spies to watch, to see if there was any opportunity to use either of the other children, although she had to admit she'd used it as something of a punishment posting. Spies rarely lasted long before receiving the Batman's wrath.

Which was why it was almost surprising when one of them called, not to beg for a transfer, but to offer something of real value.

"The second son is alive."

She rose from her desk, hands tight on the wood. "You dipped him in a Pit without permission?"

"No, he's just - alive." The man sounded faintly bewildered. "I found him wandering around on the road from Wayne Manor to Gotham. I've done tests, I managed to get a shot of the grave - He's not very responsive, but . . . "

"Hold him," she ordered immediately although that should have been obvious. "And arrange to conceal any disruption of the grave." That would be difficult, seeing as he'd been buried in the family plot, but not impossible if they staged a diversion. "I'll be there immediately." She ended the call.

She didn't know how she would use Jason quite yet. It would depend on his condition and on just how open he was to persuasion. The crudest potential was to simply hold him for ransom to force her Beloved to stand still long enough to listen to reason; more tantalizing was the idea that she could induct him into the League and lure her Beloved in with the promise of being with his son once more. Her Beloved would initially come simply to snatch him away, of course, but if he was a true believer . . . .

There were too many unknowns to judge, but that hardly mattered. One did not turn down gold found in the garden just because one didn't yet know its full worth.

* * *

He didn't want to get into the trunk of the car. The trunk was small and dark. It made him think of the box.

His hands were still bleeding sluggishly from the effort of breaking out of the box. The box where he'd breathed faster and faster, too small, too tight, _couldn't move -_

He didn't like to think of the box.

He lashed out at the men surrounding him, trying to drag him back into the dark. His body knew what to do better than he did. Now he wasn't the only one bleeding.

 _"If anyone ever tries to grab you, this is what I want you to do."_

He wasn't sure who the voice belonged to, but the memory made him feel warm, so he took its advice and started a screaming, a thin, unbroken shriek of sound that slowly grew in volume and strength.

There was a word, a word he was supposed to scream, but he couldn't remember it. Couldn't quite remember how to make it.

But the road was long and empty except for the men, the men that were dragging him towards the dark even as they bled. He screamed and thrashed, but it wasn't enough. Never enough.

They threw him in and slammed the door. A minute later, the car rumbled to life.

His breath was coming short and fast, but even on the verge of panic he realized it was going the wrong way. When he'd gotten out of the box he'd just started running, but he remembered more now. He wanted the owner of that voice, and for that he should have run the other way.

He sucked in a sobbing breath and screamed and screamed, his fists pounding uselessly in the dark.

* * *

A month of work and Jason showed frustratingly little progress. As he was, he seemed totally incapable of learning anything new, frozen in a kind of half-life.

She might have been more willing to work with that if his default reaction in this state hadn't been to take off running in the direction of Gotham with an uncanny sense of direction. When he was inevitably caught, he lashed out violently, and while she would have thought that her people were well trained enough to easily subdue a half trained _boy_ \- Well. She had been disappointed.

He ran in silence and now he fought in silence. It was only when they dragged him before her that he looked up and with stubborn malice began to _scream._

They gagged him, of course, but it was impossible to make him see reason like this. The only use she could possible put him to was a simple ransom, and she liked to think she was capable of more than that.

So. She had to bring him back from this half-life.

And for that, she would have to use the Pit.

* * *

Jason sat on the bed he'd been led to and cradled his head in his hands. He tried to ignore the two guards that were watching him.

 _Kill them. Kill them. Rip out their throats. Tear out their hearts -_

He squeezed his head like he could physically force the thoughts out.

No. No, they didn't kill. Bruce would never forgive him if he killed someone. That wasn't him. That was -

 _A flash of green, whispers hissing -_

That was something else. Something wrong with him. Something had been done.

A faint whiff of perfume hit his nose, and he looked up to see a woman considering him thoughtfully.

He'd seen her before. On the cameras in the Cave. He struggled to remember her name.

"Talia," he finally managed.

She smiled. "He speaks at last."

He looked up sharply. "At last? How long have I been here? Where is here? What happened? Where's Bruce?"

She sat down on the bed next to him.

 _Kill her._

He shoved the thought back.

"You've been with the League a little over a month. Your father is still in Gotham. You've been unwell."

He snorted. "Lady, the last thing I remember is getting _shot_. I should be a little worse off than _unwell."_

 _A box, tight and dark, hands clawing at the lid -_

He swallowed. "Scratch that. The last thing I remember is breaking out of the coffin. You want to tell me what's going on?" A horrible thought hit him. "You went grave robbing, didn't you? This is some plan to get at Bruce."

"I assure you, Jason, you broke out of the grave on your own. We're still not sure how that happened."

"Sure you don't."

She reached out to squeeze his arm. He flinched back. "Regardless, you're back with us now, and I assure you that I mean your father no harm."

"Great." He shoved himself to his feet. "So how long will it take to get home?"

She frowned. "You're still unwell. You need to recover with those who can help you best."

"I agree. Which is why I need to be in Gotham."

 _Kill her, kill her, kill, kill, killkillkill-_

He took a deep shuddering breath and clenched his fists until his nails bit into his palms hard enough to draw blood. "Trust me, lady. You don't want me here."

"I'm afraid we're long past preferences now. Your father is in grave danger."

"Is that a threat?"

"That's a fact. I need you if I'm going to save him."

"Why don't we call him, tell him about the problem, and see what he thinks? Bruce can come up with some pretty good plans."

"And when he insists I send you back? I know you're struggling with the bloodlust, Jason. I can see it in your eyes."

"He can help me," he insisted through gritted teeth.

"But will he train you?" She stood and took a step closer to him. "He coddles you boys. You should be much further along in your training. You'll have to be, to survive."

"That's a fascinating point. We should talk it over. _With Bruce."_

She patted his hair and ignored the way he jerked back and snarled. "Your training starts tomorrow."

"That's what you think," he muttered as she disappeared out the door.

* * *

Unfortunately, the room he was in didn't produce any opportunities to escape before the next day came and he was escorted by a kind of flattering number of guards to a training room.

That was okay. An opportunity would come sooner or later, and while they could force him to be present for whatever training they had in mind, they couldn't force him to engage. If it looked useful, he might take part just to lure them into a false sense of security; if it sent up any warning bells, he'd just do his best immovable object impression.

The problem, he realized almost immediately upon entering the training room, was that he was framing the situation wrong.

He heard _training,_ and he naturally, instantly, thought of Bruce. Thought of the training exercises and sparring sessions when everyone involved was careful to make sure no one was seriously hurt. Thought of the one sparring session where Bruce had been getting ready to get on the mat because he'd _promised_ and had already had to delay it once, so he was going to go through with it, injuries or no injuries. Thought of how he'd sat down on the mat and refused to engage until Bruce agreed to go back to bed like Alfred had ordered.

When he entered the room and the woman he assumed was his teacher jumped from the rafters and immediately attacked, he realized this wasn't that kind of training.

This was Willis smacking him hard enough to make his head ring to "teach him a lesson." This was getting cornered in Crime Alley by three kids far older and bigger than him and learning one of the harsh lessons of the streets. This was being tied to a chair surrounded by men with guns and desperately trying to learn how to get out of that knot.

This was _that_ kind of training, and the choice was engage or die.

Jason didn't want to die.

* * *

He curled up on the mat he'd been given, body curved around the bruises littering his stomach. His arm still burned from where the blade had caught it, and he couldn't quite hold back a whimper as a small movement jarred it.

Once, Dick had kicked him in the face on accident during training. Jason had never seen him so horrified. He'd come rushing over, and Jason had used the opportunity to drag him down to the floor with him. They'd ended up wrestling, and then wrestling had somehow turned to tickling, and Jason's ribs had hurt more from laughing than his face did.

Once, after training too long with Bruce, Jason's knuckles had been split and bleeding. Bruce had frowned with concern and taken him to get patched up, talking all the while about tricks to make sure it didn't happen in the future. He hadn't been critical about it, just trying to help, and when he'd finished wrapping Jason's knuckles he'd gotten him a huge bowl of ice cream from the kitchen.

Once while helping Alfred cook, Jason had burned his hand. Alfred had fussed over him with ice and had checked on him every day until it was completely healed.

Jason curled up tighter on the mat and refused to cry.

It hadn't always been like that. He'd been a street kid, once. He could lick his own wounds without breaking down. He'd had it worse than this before. He had _died_ once. This was nothing.

None of which changed the fact that he desperately wanted to go home.

* * *

He trained and he trained until one day, the match ended with him pressing the teacher to the floor, hands around her throat.

"Finish her," Talia said from behind him.

Jason froze, suddenly very aware of what he was doing. His hands loosened.

 _Kill,_ his mind hissed, but it was weaker than it had once been.

"No."

"She's a murderer, Jason. She's killed before. It would be justice. Finish her."

Jason stood up and backed away. His eyes darted between his opponent and Talia just in case one of them attacked. "No," he said again.

Talia sighed. "Guards."

A silver knife flashed through the air. It landed in the woman's throat.

Jason stumbled forward. "No!"

The guards grabbed him.

He turned to fight.

* * *

Everything hurt.

His ribs were bruised. Maybe worse. There was dried blood smeared under his nose and fresh blood still seeping through his hair. His arm throbbed from where it had been wrenched out of socket. All of him felt bruised.

He also felt sick, but he wasn't sure if the head injury had made him nauseous or if it was the reminder of what had happened.

A cool cloth ran over his face. Talia's hand stroked his hair. "It had to be done, Jason. Sometimes the only thing that can be done for an illness is to cut away the infection. This world is infected. We are the cure."

She kept talking like that as cleaned him up and eased the worst of the damage.

"We don't kill," he interrupted. His voice came out as a croak.

Talia paused in her examination of his ribs. She pressed, very firmly, on the worst hurt.

He couldn't stop the cry of pain.

Talia continued as if nothing had happened. "Once the infection is cleansed, the world will be whole again."

Jason didn't quite dare to speak up again, but if she wasn't going to listen to him, he wasn't going to listen to her.

Talia kept talking. Jason closed his eyes and started mentally reciting the Shakespearean monologue he'd learned for Alfred's birthday to himself.

* * *

The next teacher had new methods, but even with Jason's improved skills, it resulted in the same thing: a lot of pain.

This time, though, every time he got hurt, Talia would be there to patch him up and softly talk about the League's teachings. He thought she might be trying to get him to associate those teachings with healing.

Jason drew deep into his memories and started composing an elaborate menu of Alfred's cooking for his welcome home dinner. He didn't realize his eyes were wet until Talia gently brushed away the moisture.

He wanted to go _home_.

* * *

"You are better than this," Talia said after the latest sparring session. "You are better than him. Why do you hold back?"

"Who says I am?" he shot back. "Maybe I'm just not as good as you think I am."

She tilted her head, considering. "No. You're weak in another way. You don't want him to die."

Jason tensed.

Talia shook her head sadly and turned to one of the guards. "Go and fetch his teacher."

The teacher died slowly.

By the time the guards turned their attention to Jason, his voice was already too hoarse from screaming to make much sound.

* * *

"We do what is necessary as painlessly as possible. All other paths are cruelty."

Jason listened dully. His imagination was failing him today. All it would bring up was the blood on the training room floor, and even Talia's words were better than that.

"The petty criminals my Beloved seeks are but a symptom. They are not the true heart of the corruption. Even if he must hunt them, it is far better to remove them entirely than to merely put them away for a time."

He had been a petty criminal once. He'd taken things when he was a kid. Wallets. Food. Tires. He used to be afraid of what Bruce would do if he found out.

But he'd known pretty much from the start. Bruce had taken him in anyway.

He wanted Bruce.

* * *

He was only two days into training with the new teacher when Talia stalked in.

"We are out of time," she announced. Jason had never seen so much simmering tension pour off her. "We have to go."

At least no one was dying this time. Jason followed her out of the room. "What's going on?"

"That meddling Justice League has angered my father," she said tightly. "He will withstand the insult from my Beloved for no longer without giving some kind of answer in turn. He has demanded our presence."

Jason did _not_ like the sound of that.

* * *

The good news was, Ra's wasn't actually in their compound. They were going to have to cross the better part of Europe to get to him.

The better news was that in a trip that long, they couldn't watch him every second of every day.

They left him in a hotel room. Presumably they thought it was high enough up that he couldn't use the window to get out.

They thought wrong.

* * *

Jason wasn't sure exactly where they were. He just knew it was cold, there was wet snow blanketing the ground, and that whatever language they spoke here, he didn't know it.

When he came running into the tiny store like death was right behind him and gestured frantically for a phone, however, the woman behind the counter understood him just fine. He wasn't sure if he looked intimidating, pitiful, or just crazy, but she handed over a cellphone and let him dial.

 _Please pick up, please pick up, please pick up . . ._ He didn't have any illusions about evading the League for long, but if he could just get through to Bruce . . .

A weary voice answered the phone. "Hello?"

Jason's knees buckled, and he had to grab the counter. "Bruce." He choked back a sob. "Bruce, it's me, I know this has to seem crazy - "

* * *

Bruce had picked up the phone, expecting it to be someone from Wayne Enterprises.

He had not expected to hear his dead son's voice on the other end of the line.

"Jason?" His voice cracked. It was impossible. It couldn't - it must be some kind of trick, it had to be -

"Yeah. Yeah, it's me, Talia brought me back somehow, I don't know how, she's been keeping me with the League. This is the first time I could get away."

It was - possible. Just possible. He balanced the phone between his ear and his shoulder and turned frantically to the computer, pulling up the program so he could run a trace -

Jason - if it was Jason, it had to be Jason, _please let it be Jason_ \- sounded frantic on the other end of the phone. "Listen, I can prove it's me. Ask me anything."

"What were you wearing the first time we met?"

"A Robin costume," Jason said promptly. "The cape was made out of a girl's skirt. Of course, I didn't _realize_ that was the first time we met for a while until I put all those injuries together and figured out the big secret."

Bruce could scarcely breathe. "Jason." He was alive. His son was alive. "Where are you?" he demanded. "I'll come get you." The tracking program was still running, but he didn't want to wait the few minutes it would take for it to complete its work. He wanted to see his son _now._

"I don't know," Jason admitted. "Somewhere in Europe, they didn't want me to see." His voice turned pleading. "You can trace the call, right?"

"I'm doing it right now," Bruce assured him. "Just stay on the line. We'll have you home soon, Jaylad."

"Okay." He could hear Jason take a deep breath, and he was breathing, his son was _breathing_ and alive, and Bruce was going to get another chance. "You need to be careful," Jason warned anxiously. "Talia said that Ra's - Oh, no."

"Jason?" he demanded in alarm. "Jason!"

He could hear Jason's phone clatter to the ground. More noises - rattling, items falling, the sounds of a fight, and then Jason, Jason screaming -

"Jason!" The little dot on the screen was blinking now, location pinpointed, and he was on his feet as if he could run to the little village in time. Clark, maybe he could call Clark -

"Hello, Beloved."

"Talia," he snarled. "What have you done to my son?"

"What was necessary," she said with just a trace of regret.

"Necessary?" he demanded. "What do you want with him?" _What can I give you to get my son back?_

"I want what I've always wanted, Beloved. Unfortunately, my father has grown upset with you. He demands that you be punished, and I'm afraid I'll have to let him rage for a while before I can calm him down."

 _Punished_. Terrible images of _exactly_ what Ra's could do to Jason flooded his brain. "Talia." He felt frozen. His voice felt clunky. Wrong. "Talia, tell me what you want, and I will give it to you. Just bring Jason to me and not to Ra's. _Please."_

"I'm sorry, Beloved. I'll send back as much of him as I can."

"Talia!"

The call ended, but not before he heard one last hauntingly familiar cry.

 _As much of him as I can._

Bruce grabbed the trashcan beside the desk and promptly threw up.

The second his had his body back under control, he was dialing Clark and cursing the seconds that he'd lost.

* * *

Somehow, the League managed to evade Superman. He was able to confirm they'd been there with a boy matching Jason's description and that there'd been a fight in one of the village's small stores, but that was it.

Bruce, meanwhile, confirmed the empty grave, the coffin ruptured from the inside, and the flowers that were most decidedly not what he'd chosen for the plot of ground.

There was dried blood on the splinters of the coffin lid.

* * *

The whole family was shaken, but they'd turned to productive means of dealing with it almost immediately. Tim and Barbara were scouring the web and their contacts for any hint of information. Stephanie had quietly stopped objecting to their caffeine intake. Alfred had, with quiet confidence and optimism, started the task of making sure Jason's room was just as he would want it to be when he returned.

Dick, Bruce pulled aside. "I need you to handle the city for a little while."

Dick's mouth twisted. "I want to go with you."

"I know. But someone has to watch Gotham."

"Okay," Dick finally agreed. "Go bring him home."

* * *

"Who was it that picked up when you called the manor? Your replacement?"

Jason spat the blood out of his mouth and glared at her. "You know full well who it was." The rest of her words hit him. "My what?"

She slapped the newspapers on the table before him, keeping them there just long enough for him read the headlines. "The boy he adopted in a pitiful attempt to replace you mere months after your death. I was as surprised as you to learn you were so replaceable."

"No."

"What else has he left for you to think? He let your killers live, he takes in a new child with you not cold in your grave . . . Did he ever care for you at all, do you think?"

"What are you doing," he demanded through gritted teeth. "What's the point of all this?"

She leaned forward. "Ra's wants to punish your father. You deserve justice. You don't have to pay for your father's mistakes, Jason. You can be the one to hurt him instead."

"Hurt him."

"Ra's wants you to kill him. And once you know the full story, I think that's what you'll want too."

* * *

Until they could dig up some hint as to where to find Jason, they had no idea which of the League's bases he was at.

So Bruce pulled together a list of their known bases and started targeting them, one by one. As soon as he was sure it didn't contain Jason, it went up in flames.

Clark helped as much as he could, but he couldn't be there all the time. The Justice League, in a show of support, set up a rotation to chip in.

Bruce didn't care if he had to burn down every League base in Europe and plug every Lazarus Pit in the world.

He was getting his son back.

* * *

It was a delicate balance, training Jason.

On the one hand, he had to be good - good enough to satisfy her father, good enough to give her Beloved a challenge.

On the other hand, he couldn't be _too_ good. She didn't want his attempt to actually succeed. After her Beloved had been forced to fight, perhaps to kill, his own son, Ra's wrath would cool. She would have opportunity once again.

And at last she thought Jason might be ready.

* * *

It had been two months since he got the call. Bruce had yet to find Jason.

Then he got the call.

"B?" Oracle said. "I think we've got something."

His email dinged. The message was filled with attachments - newspaper articles and video clips from news sites. The stories started on the West Coast, but they quickly migrated towards Gotham.

A mysterious vigilante had been fighting his way across the US with extreme aggression although there had been no fatalities yet. Some accurately, if uncreatively, called him the Red Hood due to the red cowl he wore as part of his uniform. Others called him Red Robin, choosing the color both for his costume and for the trail of blood he left behind him.

"Why Robin?" he asked.

"Grainy footage suggests he might have a bat on his body armor. Also, there's - this."

A second email appeared. It was filled with photos.

A statue celebrating the Justice League had been vandalized. Specifically, the statue of Batman had been decapitated, the crumbled head lying at the other heroes's feet. A bat spray painted on a railway car had been crossed out with red spray paint that dripped down from the animal like blood. A street vendor who sold hero themed merchandise had lost his entire stock of Batman t-shirts. They'd later been found ripped to shreds.

This list went on and on. All of them were credited to the vigilante.

"One theory is that you and Robin had some kind of falling out and that's why no one's seen him for so many years. They think he's out to get revenge. Obviously we know that's not true, but . . . "

It was hard to swallow. "But," he agreed.

If Jason was angry, Bruce would be the last to blame him. He was just glad his son was still _alive._

But it hurt to look at all that anger. To want to see his son so badly and to know the feeling wasn't reciprocated.

What had happened between that phone call and now? What had the League done to him?

"I'm coming back to the States. Any idea where he'll hit next?"

"Absolutely. He's been moving pretty much in a straight line. He's set to hit Metropolis next. They've got another statue of the Justice League there. That seems like his most likely target."

"Then that's where I'll be waiting."

* * *

Everyone agreed with the most basic form of his plan: Hide near the statue and wait for Jason.

What they tended to agree with less was his insistence on waiting alone and as Bruce Wayne rather than Batman.

Bruce had argued that he didn't want to crowd Jason. The last thing he wanted was for this to look like an ambush. If Jason felt cornered, he would strike out, and they would lose their chance to talk him down.

He didn't want to wear the batsuit for some of the same reasons. He didn't want to look like he was dressed for battle.

He'd also noted a trend. Jason had attacked the bat.

He hadn't attacked Bruce Wayne.

None of Wayne Enterprises' branches had been attacked. No tabloids with his face had been lit on fire.

So maybe, just maybe, if he came as Jason's father instead of the cowl, maybe he could reach him.

They had wanted him to at least wear some kind of body armor. Bruce had pointed out that Jason had been trained to spot that.

So he was here. Alone, save for the comm in his ear and his near certainty that Clark was lurking halfway across the city, ears locked on whatever might happen here.

He sat on the edge of the statue and waited.

He didn't have to wait long.

Jason was taller. That was the first thing he noticed. He'd grown, and some of his muscles had started to fill out, but he was far too thin.

He was wearing the costume he had become known for. Black cargo pants. Red body armor across the chest with a bat splashed across it. A dark red hood obscuring his face.

And a gun hanging at his hip.

Jason froze when he saw Bruce. Slowly, very slowly, he reached up and pushed the hood back.

 _Jason._

Jason's eyes darted to the rooftops and alleys surrounding them.

"I came alone," Bruce told him. His voice was shaking.

Jason's eyes snapped back to him. "I didn't think I'd see you until I hit Gotham." He sounded stunned. Bewildered.

Bruce couldn't help but laugh in disbelief. "I came the _second_ I knew where you were going to be."

Jason took a step back at the intensity of his words. His hand jerked nervously to his gun.

Bruce raised his hands slowly.

It wasn't what he wanted to do. He wanted to run over there and pull Jason close, to cling to him until the memory of holding his lifeless body faded from his arms. He wanted to carry him back to the car, never mind how big he had gotten, and get him safely home.

But that wasn't what Jason needed, so Bruce would wait.

Jason's hand settled on the gun in clear threat, but he didn't draw it yet. "Not here. We're not doing this here."

"Okay," Bruce agreed easily. "Where do you want to go?"

Jason's eyes darted around again and settled on a narrow alley well shielded by the buildings around it. "There."

"Okay," Bruce said again. He backed towards it slowly, never taking his eyes off Jason.

If he looked away, he would lose him again. He couldn't lose him again.

But Jason followed him step for step until they were cloaked in the shadows of the alley. The moment they were both concealed in it, he sped up, getting almost close enough to Bruce to touch. His body language was tense. Aggressive.

"Bruce." The word was whispered, and -

Not angry. Almost - disbelieving. Awed.

Then Jason took a shaky breath, pulled himself together, and hissed in a rapid whisper. "We're not alone. There are snipers on the roofs above us. I bought us a minute, probably less."

And even Bruce, with all his intellect, was frozen for a moment because - What?

Jason pulled the gun and fired it at the trashcan a few yards further down the alley.

"That might buy us another one if they're still just listening. Ra's wants you dead. They want me to kill you. Once they realize that's not happening, they're going to come after us both. I had a plan, but it was for Gotham, not - " He waved his free hand helplessly.

Jason didn't want him dead.

He needed a plan, but that was the thought that kept echoing around and obscuring all else.

Jason didn't want him dead.

"Pulling up cameras now, B," Tim said through the comm, voice tight. "He's right. How did we miss this?"

"League," Barbara hissed. "Okay, follow the alley out and then do exactly what I tell you."

He nodded. "Oracle's got a plan," he told Jason. "Come on."

He grabbed his arm and took off running. Jason followed without question. He could probably let go, but -

But.

"Left," Oracle ordered as they hit the alley. "There's a subway station entrance. Try to - "

A bullet ricocheted off the brick an inch from Bruce's head.

Jason plowed into him, knocking him aside and taking the next bullet to his vest. He stumbled from the force of it.

 _No._

He pulled Jason towards the subway entrance, all but flying down the stairs. "Clark, we've got trouble."

"This station's pretty much abandoned tonight," Tim informed him as they burst into it. "No cover, but also no civilians in the crossfire. There'll be an opportunity to hop on board in . . . two minutes."

Either Clark had heard or he hadn't. Bruce turned to Jason. "Are you alright?"

"Fine," he gasped. "Just got the wind knocked out of me."

Bruce took a deep breath, nodded, and then pulled Jason into a desperate hug.

"Watch the ribs!" he protested, but his arms were already locked around Bruce, holding on just as tightly. "You're here," Jason breathed after a moment like he couldn't quite believe it. "You're alive."

Bruce let out a choked laugh. _"I'm_ alive?" He cupped a hand around Jason's head, still trying to grasp that this was really happening. "I've missed you, Jay. I've missed you so much."

Jason was shaking in his arms. Bruce stroked his hair to try and soothe him. He wanted more than anything to just keep looking down, looking at his son, but he forced himself to watch the entrance. Just in case.

"Supes has got the snipers," Barbara reported.

"But there are others coming in," Tim reported tensely. "You've got trouble, B."

One more minute. They just needed one more minute and the subway would be here. He didn't have any armor, any weapons, any contingency for this.

Shadows filled the doorway. The lights glinted off metal.

The sound of the subway became faintly audible.

Jason hadn't seen them. He was still wrapped up tightly in Bruce's arms.

So Bruce kept hold and turned, putting his back between Jason and the knives that came spinning through the air towards them.

He barely noticed the pain, but he welcomed what he felt of it. He had been hit. He, and not Jason. Never Jason.

The subway was shrieking closer now, and that was good, because he couldn't walk. Couldn't stand. Couldn't do anything but sink to his knees as the pain slowly dug in.

Had to get up. Had to protect Jason.

Jason, who was shouting in fury, who was between Bruce and his attackers now and fighting like Bruce had never seen him fight before.

He had to get up. He had to -

* * *

Bruce woke up in a hospital to see Jason sitting slumped in the visitor's chair and glaring at him.

All things considered, Bruce was okay with that.

"You just got out of surgery for your _shredded back_ ," Jason informed him, still glaring. "The others are on their way." It was a long drive between Metropolis and Gotham. "And I hope someone other than Dick is driving, because he's been chattering in my ear ever since I put in the comm."

Jason could just take out the comm, of course, but Bruce decided not to point this out. "What happened?"

"What happened?" Jason exploded. "What _happened?_ You forgot which one of us was wearing body armor, that's what happened!"

"Stopping bullets and stopping knives are two different things," Bruce pointed out. "I couldn't take the risk."

"The whole point of this stupid thing was making sure you didn't die! How did that help anything?"

"The point was to get you home," Bruce corrected. _The point was not to fail you again._ "You fought them off?"

Jason shrugged uncomfortably. "Yeah. Got most of them knocked out before Supes showed up."

"Well done," Bruce said warmly.

Jason's ears turned red. "Thought you didn't want us fighting."

"I don't. But it doesn't sound like you had much choice this time."

Jason looked down. "No." He rubbed his arms like he was cold. "Not much choice at all."

"Come here." Bruce was careful to keep his voice gentle. He patted the edge of the bed.

Jason walked over and perched on it hesitantly for a moment before scooting back so he could lean against the warmth of Bruce's side.

"What happened after the phone call?" Bruce asked.

Jason flinched. "Ra's got Talia to try and get me to kill you. I don't think she actually wanted me to succeed, for whatever that's worth, but Ra's sure did. He wanted to make sure someone would finish the job if I couldn't. I had to make them think I would try," he said, half defensively, half pleading. "It was the only way they were ever going to let me out of there, if they thought I was going to try. So I played along. Played it up."

Bruce reached out and took his hand. Squeezed it firmly and ignored the way his back twinged at the arm movement. "You did a good job."

"He was really mad," Jason said. "I mean, he was mad before, but when you started burning down his bases . . . "

"He should have known that's what would happen when he took you," Bruce growled. He took a deep breath and forced himself to calm down. "How did they try to get you to do it?"

Jason flinched.

"Did they hurt you?" he demanded.

"Some," Jason admitted. "They threw me into a lot of 'training' I wasn't ready for, and then Talia would patch me up and talk at me about how you hadn't avenged my death, that you'd replaced me, yada, yada, yada. 'Course, I wasn't exactly inclined to believe her, considering the circumstances."

Bruce's chest tightened. "You're irreplaceable," he promised. He took a deep breath. "But there is something you should know."

"Tim," Jason said with a nod. "What? Don't look so surprised. Talia kept flashing these news headlines in my face, but it got kind of suspicious that she wouldn't let me read the articles, you know? So I snuck a look when I got out. Read some more on your phone while I was waiting for you to wake up."

"And?"

Jason hunched in on himself a bit uncomfortably. "And it looked like the kid hasn't exactly had an easy time of it either, and, well . . . I didn't replace Dick, right? So the kid's not a replacement for me." He looked over at Bruce quickly and then looked away again.

"Exactly right," Bruce agreed firmly, squeezing his hand again.

"He been helping out with . . . you know."

"He has."

"You didn't give him my name, did you?"

"You're the one and only Jay," he promised. "He went by T for a while, but Dick insisted he needed a bird name. Since his name didn't lend itself as well as yours does, Dick decided he ought to be Robin."

Jason started a bit. "He's Robin? Then what's Dick?"

"Nightwing." Bruce swallowed. "He changed mantles shortly after . . . "

"My death," Jason finished. He shook his head. "Wow, that's a weird thing to be able to say. Any other big news I should know?"

"We've got a new medic down in the Cave. I had to stop her from going out patrolling."

"You adopted _another_ kid?"

"I didn't adopt her."

"You know, it's kind of adorable that you sound so put out by that."

Bruce opened his mouth to reply, and it suddenly hit him all over again. Jason was alive. Jason was here. Jason didn't hate him.

Jason elbowed him gently, looking concerned. "Hey. You okay there, B?"

"You're here," Bruce said. That was answer enough. "I love you so much, Jay."

"Annnd, the good drugs are kicking in, aren't they?" Jason looked over at the IV as if to check it.

Something might be kicking in, Bruce admitted to himself. It was getting harder to keep his eyes open.

He wasn't so far gone that he didn't hear Jason's mumbled, "Love you too, Dad," though.

* * *

"Dick, you're going to have to let go eventually," Jason mumbled into Dick's shoulder.

Dick just clung to him even tighter. "Nope."

Jason struggled weakly. "Alfred, help me out here."

Wait, were those actually tears in the old butler's eyes? "I'm sure I don't know what you mean, sir. But we are all very glad to have you returned to us."

"Babs?"

She patted his back reassuringly. "He'll fall asleep eventually."

"He's an octopus when he's asleep. That's not going to help." Bruce was still asleep, so there'd be no help from him, and the new girl wasn't there - hadn't been able to get permission from her mom, according to Dick's babble on the way up. So that left - "New guy. Tim. Help me out here. Win that favorite brother award."

"I remember when _I_ was you favorite brother."

"Dick, you were my only brother. Seriously. Tim. Help me."

"I could go get a crowbar?" Tim suggested doubtfully.

Jason pointed to Tim as best he could. "There. Critical thinking. I like it. Get a crowbar. Get all the crowbars. We're going to need them."

"You missed two years of hugs. We have to make up for them," Dick protested.

 _"Not all at once,_ we don't."

"Five more minutes."

Jason sighed and finally returned the hug he refused to admit he was enjoying. "One."

"Three."

"This is not a negotiation."

"Nope," Dick said cheerfully. "It's not. Because I've got all the leverage."

"Not if Tim gets a crowbar, you don't. Or my gun. Tim, pass me my gun."

"I don't think that's a good idea."

"You do not intend to keep the weapon, I hope, Master Jason?"

"Nah. Hey, Dick, you need a backup for the job?"

Dick laughed. "Doesn't work like that, Jaybird."

"Well, I can't just take it to the thrift shop."

They weren't back in Gotham just yet, but that was alright.

He was home.

* * *

 **Next up: Damian.**

 **Jason:**

 **With a better relationship with Dick and no fight over the Robin mantle, I think Jason would have had a better shot at coming back non-vengeful.**

 **The need for vengeance is also lessened because with the Joker, the system failed. Epically. The Joker wasn't sufficiently punished, and he certainly wasn't stopped.**

 **Here, the system worked. The bad guys are in jail. They're going to stay in jail. Before they went to jail, Bruce beat them within an inch of their lives. If any criminals made the connection between "Jason Wayne died" and "Batman broke way too many of my bones last night," then some of those criminals might not have survived jail.**

 **Also, critically, before Jason learned any of this, he had that phone call with Bruce where Bruce, very obviously, cared. He's starting from a different place and working with different information, so we get a nonmurderous result.**


	6. Damian

**A/N: Small time skip on this one - Jason is almost eighteen and Tim and Steph are both sixteen at the start of this chapter. By the end of it, Jason is nineteen and Tim and Steph are both seventeen. Damian starts at nine and ends at ten. Dick is, at least legally, an adult, and so it doesn't matter as much.**

 **Hunger Games and Princess Bride references. Warnings for one sentence that could be construed as suicidal and violent coping mechanisms.**

* * *

"So I'm going to be eighteen in a couple of months."

"Technically," Tim started to say.

"Nope. I was born eighteen years ago. I'll be eighteen. Even if I was . . . out of it for a bit."

Bruce looked up from his dinner plate with one dying hope fading from his eyes. "And . . . you're looking forward to getting registered to vote?"

"Ha." Jason leaned back in his chair. "No. I want to go out in the cape."

"Wouldn't you rather just focus on your schoolwork?" Bruce asked hopefully. Jason had been hard at work at getting back on track with his schooling ever since they'd managed to get him declared legally alive again.

Jason shook his head seriously. "I want to help. The Pit's gone quieter. I can manage this."

 _You've been helping,_ Bruce wanted to protest, but he'd seen how antsy Jason was in the cave.

Tim was the only other one there that night. Dick and Barbara were out on a date, and Stephanie was volunteering with Dr. Thompkins. Bruce wished one of the others was here to back him up.

Not that they would, necessarily, as Tim proved.

"Have you picked out a name yet?"

Jason pointed his fork at him. "Good question, little brother. I've been thinking about that."

"You're not sticking with what the papers called you?" Bruce asked, finally resigned.

Jason shook his head. "Nah. I don't . . . I don't want to be that guy that the League made me be."

Bruce nodded. "What, then?"

Jason looked down and poked at his food. "I was thinking maybe Flamebird. If Clark was okay with it."

The other half of the Kryptonian legend that Dick had taken his name from. "I'm sure he would be."

"Fits with the bird theme," Tim put in. "And Dick'll be thrilled."

Jason rolled his eyes. "Yeah, I'm not looking forward to that part. I just - Well, a fire bird sounds an awful like a phoenix, you know? I guess I liked the symbolism of that."

"New life," Bruce said quietly.

"Yeah. That." Jason grinned. "Plus, I'm always up for setting something on fire."

* * *

Bruce stood outside the door in the Cave where Jason was changing into his suit for the first time. "You won't go off on your own. You'll stay with me or Nightwing at all times."

"I heard you the first million times, B. I've got this."

"Bruce!" Stephanie yelled. "Come over here and glare at Nightwing for me while I fix his stitches."

Bruce sighed. "I'll be right over there," he promised before going to see what his eldest had done _now._

Apparently, he had ripped his stitches doing an ill advised practice move. "You know what that means," he warned Dick while Stephanie fixed them in pointed silence.

"Ah, Bruce," he whined. "It's Jaybird's first night."

"And it's not going to be your last. You're staying in tonight.

"Done," Stephanie announced. She turned to Dick. "And you had better stay in, because if you rip these again tonight, I will not be responsible for my actions."

"Fine," he sighed. He twisted around to look at where Jason had been changing. The door was now slightly open. "Hey, where'd he go?"

Bruce scanned the Cave. His eyes paused on the Batmobile, which was currently wrapped in shadow. One shadow on top of the car seemed darker than it should be. Dick followed his gaze. "Is that - "

The shadow turned to flame.

Molten eyes peered out of the darkness of the mask. Flickering flames danced up the edges and the ridges of a flared cape that reminded him of a dragon's wing. The edges of the bat symbol on his chest bled fire. Light danced around sharp claws.

Jason turned off the fake flames and jumped down from the Batmobile. "Everyone gets one free 'girl on fire' joke," he announced. "After that, my retaliation will be brutal."

Nightwing shut his mouth with a sharp click. "That was actually kind of terrifying."

"Thanks." Jason's mouth was visible beneath the mask. It was turned up in a pleased grin.

The basic outfit was black like Bruce's. They'd added retractable claws to the gloves to make it easier for him to slice through . . . things . . . if the need ever arose.

(They had trained on knots until even Bruce had to admit he was ready.)

Bruce had worked with him on the rest.

Without the fire, it was suitably subtle. With the fire . . .

"Brilliant," Barbara said warmly.

"I love it," Stephanie said.

Tim looked up from his camera. "I got pictures."

"And I demand first look at them later." Jason bounced on his feet. "Ready, Boss?"

If he couldn't stop him, he could at least be proud of him. "Ready."

* * *

"This is the third ninja incursion this month. I'm starting to think Ra's doesn't like us anymore." Jason swung himself up onto the fire escape above the assailants he and Bruce had just taken down.

"Well, you did burn down half his European bases," Barbara said dryly.

"B did that," he protested. "I was my usual delightful self."

Jason was pretty sure that under that cowl, Bruce was hiding a smile. "I'm sure."

* * *

"You know, we've had assassin attacks over the last two months and not one of them has targeted me," Nightwing mused. "I think I'm offended."

"Well, I've finally managed to hack into Ra's network, so if you want me to send him a message to let him know, I'd be happy to," Tim said wryly.

"No," Bruce said instantly over the comms.

"We're not actually _that_ stupid, B," Tim said, rolling his eyes.

Bruce's silence seemed a little doubtful.

* * *

"Okay, this is new," Nightwing announced. He was crouched in the rafters of a warehouse and watching the scene below with more bafflement than concern. "Now the assassins are fighting each other."

"There's been a lot of turmoil in the ranks," Tim said. "I think Bruce and Jason really kicked a hornet's nest. I've been wading through their communications. It's fascinating reading. They're basically on the brink of a civil war."

"Oh, no. How sad."

Tim grinned. "Maybe don't take up acting as a career choice, Flamebird."

* * *

Jason should have been the first one down to the Cave.

Barbara was coming in late due to some event at the library she worked at. Dick was still upstairs trying to talk Tim into designing some costumed monstrosity in preparation for his eighteenth birthday. Stephanie was up there with them, nominally to act as Tim's backup, in reality there to cackle over the look on his face. Alfred was cleaning up dinner. Bruce was "taking care of something in his study" which Jason was pretty sure was code for "taking the pain pills I refuse to admit I need."

Jason wasn't sure if that a _refusal to admit weakness_ thing or a _respecting Jason's issues regarding parental figures self-medicating thing,_ and it didn't really matter. That wasn't the point right now.

The point was, Jason should have been the only one in the Cave.

Which was why it was so concerning when out of the corner of his eye, he caught movement.

He wasn't armed. He wasn't even dressed in his suit yet.

If there was someone in here, they probably wouldn't let him go near the weapons without attacking. That was okay.

He kept walking like he hadn't noticed a thing. He just adjusted his angle slightly so that he was headed for the medical counters instead of the equipment area.

Lots of reflective surfaces so he could keep an eye on his back. Lots of sharp implements. Lots of syringes filled with all sorts of interesting things.

Also, a panic button that would bring the whole house running.

He reached the counter. Heard a whisper of sound behind him. He yanked one of the drawers open and grabbed a syringe of sedatives. Pulled the cap off casually, like he was in no particular hurry -

And whirled, needle stabbing forwards.

It hit air. Not because his opponent wasn't there.

But because his opponent was an awful lot shorter than he would have expected.

The tiny assassin swung a sword at Jason's chest. Jason dropped to the floor and swung his legs out, catching the assassin at the knees and knocking him to the floor.

Jason was on his feet in an instant. He punched the panic button wired under the counter on his way up.

Normally, he'd say he could handle one lone League assassin.

Normally, said assassins hadn't made it into the Cave.

"Surrender," the munchkin spat. He'd rolled to his feet and was holding the sword in front of him. "You cannot hope to win in honorable combat."

"You ambushed me with a sword while I was holding a syringe," he pointed out. "What about this strikes you as honorable combat?"

Mid-sentence, he chucked the syringe at the - was that a kid? The kid's hood had fallen back to reveal a surprisingly young face.

The baby assassin dodged. Jason took the opportunity to swing himself up and over the counter. With that between them, maybe he could run for the stash of batarangs -

The kid leaped after him. Jason sprang sideways from the sword.

He didn't see the knife.

It didn't get buried in his gut at least. It just . . . grazed him.

Okay, maybe a little bit more than grazed.

He stumbled back a few steps. The kid was smirking at him. The baby assassin's eyes kept flickering between him and the knife, sword at the ready. Likely, he expected Jason to dive for the knife, and the kid would be ready when he did.

Well, good for the kid. Jason wasn't going for the knife.

They were almost to the Batmobile now. The Batmobile that Jason and Bruce had been upgrading recently.

Jason was going for his old friend the tire iron.

He dove right, the opposite direction from the knife, and ignored the screaming in his stomach. There were actually two tire irons on the table. He flung one at the kid's head and grabbed the other to hold in front of him.

Not quite as good as a sword, but at least it had some length to it.

The kid dodged to the side so that the iron only clipped his shoulder. "Pathetic," he sneered. "You are not worthy of your title. I shall honor it far better."

His _title?_ What did the kid care about his title?

He might could figure it out, but unfortunately, he had a couple of other things to think about.

For instance, judging by the numbness spreading out from his wound, that knife had been dosed with something.

Better end this fast, then.

He sprang forward. He swung the iron up to block the kid's swipe with the sword. His free hand punched the kid in the stomach.

The kid, of course, was wearing body armor. The punch bounced off, so Jason grabbed a fistful of the kid's cape and dragged them both to the floor, trusting his greater size and weight to win a wrestling match.

Plus, the numbness was spreading, and if he was going to fall, better he not be so far from the ground.

He managed to pin the kid's sword hand to the floor, but the kid's free hand clawed at his wound, and, okay, that was not okay, that was not okay -

"Tag!" Dick shouted.

Jason wrenched himself free of the kid and rolled out of the way. If Nightwing was tagging in, then he was out.

Which was a good thing, because he suddenly realized there was quite a lot of blood on the floor, and most, if not all of it, was his.

Steph was on her knees beside him instantly. "Robin, guard," she said tensely. She hadn't had time to grab a thing of bandages, so she wrenched off her sweatshirt and pressed it to the wound. "Flame, what do I need to know?"

"Wound's numb," he gritted out. "I think it's poisoned."

Stephanie spat out something Alfred would most definitely not have approved of.

"Could just be a paralytic," Tim offered.

"You say - the nicest things," Jason got out.

Stephanie ignored him. "We need to know what it is."

Tim nodded and surveyed the scene. "Knife or sword?"

"Knife." Jason turned his head to see how the fight was progressing. Hopefully it hadn't gotten too close -

The fight was practically on top of the knife.

Using Dick's vigilante name had apparently been a bit off; he was no more in costume than Jason was. He'd only stopped long enough to grab his escrima sticks.

Jason would have thought that the kid's age might have thrown Dick off, but he'd never seen Dick fight so viciously. The kid was holding him off, barely, but his movements were stiffer now, and Jason was pretty sure that Dick had cracked something in the kid's left arm.

Still, the kid was pretty vicious himself. It wasn't a fight Jason would have been eager to get in the middle of.

Tim analyzed it for a moment and then took off running for the knife.

Great kid, Tim.

Stephanie shifted to block his view of the fight. "I need you to stay calm," she said. "The faster your heart beats - "

"Faster the poison spreads," he finished. "That's not very calming."

"Got it!" Tim shouted.

That was. He took a deep breath.

"Good," Stephanie encouraged. "Count with me. One Batman, two Batmans - "

"Batmen," he corrected.

"Three _Batmans_ ," she insisted. She was grinning at him.

Okay. He was okay. The equipment down here was ridiculously fast. They'd figure this out.

Something slammed into the ground. Stephanie threw a quick glance over her shoulder. "It's okay," she assured him. "It wasn't anyone we like."

"Tell me what you did to my brother," he heard Dick growl. _"Now."_

Hearing Dick threaten someone on his behalf was strangely calming.

"He will die as he deserves," the baby assassin hissed.

That, not so much.

"What. Happened."

Bruce.

The study was further away from the Cave than the others had been. Even at top speed, of course it would have taken him the longest.

"Four Batmen," he whispered to Steph. It was possible that the blood loss was making him a little giddy.

"Batman," Dick said in relief.

In stiff, almost embarrassed tones, the baby assassin said, "Father."

* * *

Bruce had been called _Dad_ before. Not . . . often, exactly, but his children had used it on occasion.

Dick hesitated to use it, and Bruce didn't blame him. Of all his sons, only Dick'd had a father worth the title, and he'd never wanted Dick to think he was trying to replace the irreplaceable.

Still, the title was implicit on Father's Day when Dick slipped a gift into his office or bedroom and had actually been spoken a few times when Dick was particularly badly injured or dosed up on something. About half those times, admittedly, Bruce wasn't entirely sure the title had been directed at him as opposed to a hallucination, but it had happened.

Jason used it far more frequently. Sarcastically, when Bruce got too overprotective for his taste. Quietly, when Bruce had gotten hurt and had scared him. Pleadingly, whenever he got hurt himself.

Jason used it every time he felt the situation gave him an excuse, and Bruce wished he could find a way to tell him that he didn't need one. That it made his heart warm to hear it every time and that he wished Jason wouldn't wait until one of them was pushed to the edge to use it.

Before Jason had come back, Tim hadn't used it once. Not even when he was dying. After he'd heard Jason use it a few times, he'd held onto it carefully and used it sparsely in charged moments, each time examining Bruce's reaction like he wanted to make sure it was okay.

Of course it was okay. It was more than okay.

Barbara and Stephanie never used it, of course, unless it was for a joke. They weren't his the way the others were for all he was at least somewhat responsible for them.

And for all that he wished Dick would hurry it up and at least make him Barbara's father- _in-law._

He'd felt a lot of things when he'd heard that title. Honored. Proud. Electrified. Terrified, sometimes, because if one of them was using it, there was usually something terribly wrong.

Then the word 'Father' hit his ears and it felt like nothing quite so much as getting hit in the gut with a crowbar.

For a moment, the only sound in the room was the beeping of the machinery as Tim analyzed something Bruce had a sick feeling was poison.

Then Stephanie said, a little shrilly, "You adopted a baby assassin _without telling us?"_

"Tt. I am not adopted. I am the real son."

"No," Bruce said immediately, but his eyes were locked on what he could see of the boy, pinned as he was beneath his eldest.

The clothes of one of the League's assassins. Black hair. Skin not quite so dark as Talia's -

Bruce forced himself to look away, and as he did, he saw Jason.

"Spoiler, call the doctor," he ordered tightly, taking her place at Jason's side. No names until they figured out what the boy already knew. "Nightwing, secure the boy and run a paternity check. Robin - "

"Results from the toxin analysis just came in," Tim announced. "We've got something that should work to counteract it." He angled the screen at Stephanie, who nodded as she finished her call.

"I'll get it now."

"It'll be okay, Jason," Bruce promised him.

"Good," he muttered. "'Cause I can't move my arms." He could evidently still move his head though, because he flopped it to the side to look at the boy. "Please tell me the kid isn't Talia's."

The boy thrashed in Dick's grip. "Is that an insult to my mother, you pathetic piece of gutter - "

"Enough," Bruce snapped.

"On the bright side," Jason mumbled, "if he is your's, he'll fit right in with the rest of Gotham's elite. He's already nailed the charm."

* * *

Tim sat anxiously outside the curtained off area where Dr. Thompkins was working on Jason. Stephanie, at least, got to be behind the curtain helping out. He could do nothing but sit outside with the newly arrived Barbara and wait for Dick and Bruce to finish running the tests.

He drummed his fingers on the armrest. "Has anyone let Alfred know? I should go let Alfred know."

"I assure you, young sir, I have been informed." Alfred materialized beside him with a tray of tea. "Something soothing to drink, perhaps?"

"No, thanks," he said miserably.

Barbara shot him a sympathetic look. "Leave them both here, please, Alfred. I'll make him drink something."

"I just want to be doing something," he said as soon as Alfred left. "It's driving me crazy."

"Trust me, I know the feeling. I've been looking over the Cave's surveillance footage on my phone ever since I got here."

He should have thought of that. "Anything?"

"Surprisingly little. Whoever the kid is, he's good." She glanced up from the footage. "Here Dick comes."

"And Bruce is going to interrogate our intruder. Do you think that means - ?"

"We'll find out."

Dick collapsed into the seat next to them. "As I told Bruce: Congratulations, it's a boy."

* * *

The fighter that had stepped in - Grayson, his memory of his mother's files informed him - had secured him surprisingly well to the chair, but his efforts had been impeded by his reluctance to do permanent harm. No doubt he feared potential future retaliation once Damian was confirmed to be the heir. Damian thought he could probably get out of the restraints eventually, but not without suffering injury and not without taking considerable time.

Time which might not prove necessary. The tests must be done. His father was approaching.

Damian refused to give any outward sign of his . . . not nerves. Uncertainty, perhaps. He was the proper heir, of course, and a clearly superior one at that, and, as his mother had said and his observation here had proven, his father seemed to value the presence of young acolytes.

It was just that all of the others, inferior as they undoubtedly were, had been selected by his father at a time and manner of his choosing. Damian had arrive unannounced, and his mother had been clear that Father disliked intrusions into his plans.

It had been unavoidable, of course, and if given the chance he would prove himself worthwhile, but he had been hoping to meet his father as a freshly declared victor, not as a defeated contender.

He would have won had there been no interference. He would have.

His father stopped right in front of him. He was just as impressively imposing in person as Damian had always imagined, even when dressed as a civilian.

"Talia is your mother?"

"She is." He was prepared for more questions about his mother. She kept scrupulous tabs on Father but was still always eager to interrogate anyone who had interacted with him. He assumed Father would be the same.

"So you're . . . nine, then." Father sounded pained by this.

Perhaps he preferred to keep subtler track of mother.

In the meantime, Father was . . . displeased? Perhaps he would have preferred that Damian be older, more useful. After Grayson, all his students had been at least on the verge of puberty. He might have discovered with Grayson that he found the younger years distasteful.

"I am already quite well trained," he assured his father. "I will be a valuable asset."

Father pinched the bridge of his nose. "She hid you from me for nine years," he repeated, "and she trained you to be an assassin."

"She trained me to be your heir," Damian corrected.

Father took a deep breath. "Let's start back at the beginning. What's your name?"

That was far firmer ground. "Damian al Ghul. Or Wayne, once you acknowledge me."

"Damian," his father repeated. He lingered over the name in a way that made Damian feel oddly warm. "She chose a name that means 'harmless?'"

"The Greek meaning is unfortunate," Damian admitted. "Mother has informed me that she intended the Indian one."

"Tamer," Father said quietly. "And just what are you meant to tame?"

Damian blinked at him. "Everything."

"Of course you are." Father sounded suddenly exhausted in the same way that Mother had shortly before she sent him away, and Damian couldn't hold back a shiver of fear. Father wouldn't send him away too, would he?

"Why did she send you here?" Father finally asked. "To finish the job Jason failed to do?"

Damian straightened. There was an opportunity here. "I am more than happy to do anything that those incompetents cannot."

Father raised an eyebrow rather pointedly at the chair, and Damian swallowed back his shame.

Then Father continued and the shame rose and mixed into horrified confusion. "The job Jason refused to do was to kill me."

"Mother would never do that!" Damian protested instantly.

Father's face gentled somewhat, and Damian ground his teeth together. He was not a _child_ to be coddled. It was no emotional protestation, merely his greater knowledge of the situation.

He plowed forward. "There has been great unrest in the League. It was disrupting my training. My mother thought it was an ideal time for me to come learn from you."

Father's face hardened once more. "Learn from."

Surely - Surely Father would not refuse to teach him?

"That sounds like a temporary arrangement. She intends to take you back?"

Mother had been less than clear on that point, Damian had to admit to himself. Sometimes she had spoken of him going to see his father as if it was the culmination of his training, the place where he would stay unless his father sent him elsewhere. Other times she had spoken of it as a mere stop.

"She will come back to check my progress periodically," Damian settled on saying. He was sure that much, at least, was true. "I am sure you can come to a mutually satisfying agreement then."

Father looked less sure. Damian didn't blame him. Mother could be frighteningly good at getting her way.

His father was at least willing to table the issue, however. "If you're here to train, then why did you attack the first person to enter the Cave?"

"It wasn't because he was first," Damian assured him. He would have waited had he had to. "I desire to defeat Todd in order to claim his position."

"His position," Father repeated. "As Flamebird?"

He nodded eagerly. "I am an excellent fighter, Father. I wish to help you on your crusade and would be most happy to do as your partner as Flamebird does."

His father sighed. "And why Flamebird and not Nightwing?"

Damian shifted a bit uncomfortably.

The truth was, he had examined all of their files and learned that of the two, Flamebird spent far more time by his father's side while Nightwing was allowed on independent missions. The trust of the latter ought to appeal to him, but . . . "It would allow me more opportunities to learn from you, Father. If you feel I am better suited for the other position, however, and would like me to direct my energies there - "

"No," Father interrupted, holding up a hand. "That may be how positions are gained in the League, but it's not how we do things here. If you _ever_ hurt one of your brothers like that again - " His voice had dropped to the low rumble he must use as the Batman.

Damian bowed his head. "As you wish, Father." His maneuvering would have to be more subtle.

"Secondly," Father continued, "even if you do someday take on the mantle of Flamebird, it won't be till you're eighteen."

Damian's head snapped up. "What?"

"No one hits the streets until they're eighteen. That's the rule."

"But that was because you had to train the others," Damain protested. "I'm ready now!"

"No. You're not."

Damian gritted his teeth. He would have to find an opportunity to prove otherwise. In the meantime - "I assume that means I will be working down in the Cave then?"

His father considered this for a moment. "Dick and Tim didn't started until they were thirteen. Jason didn't start until he was twelve. I want you at least that old before you come down here for anything but training again."

"I can be useful!"

Father crouched down in front of him. Damian wasn't sure why. He lost the imposing height advantage that way. "I don't want you to be useful."

He didn't -

Damian blinked and tried to pretend he wasn't stung.

Father put a hand on his shoulder, and it took everything Damian had not to lean into this first touch from his father. "I want you to have a childhood."

"I am not a child."

He wasn't sure why that made his father look sad.

"Your word that you won't attack anyone in this Cave," Father demanded.

"You have it," Damian said grudgingly.

"Thank you." Just like that, his father started to undo the restraints. When the last one was undone, his father hesitated in front of him for a moment, and Damian sat still, waiting for instructions.

Instead, his father slowly, carefully, wrapped him in a hug. Damian sat frozen in the middle of it.

"Welcome home, son."

* * *

The good news was that Jason was healing.

The bad news was that he was in little enough pain to refuse the pain meds and in enough pain to be cranky about it.

"So whose fault is this exactly?" he grumbled from the couch he'd set up a nest in.

"Damian's?" Tim hazarded.

"Bruce's," Stephanie suggested.

"I say we blame Talia's parenting and move forward," Dick said.

Jason rolled his eyes. "Not what I meant. The kid's nine years old, right? We all know that precedes Timmy here's time with us - "

"I hadn't even figured out who Robin was yet," Tim agreed.

"And it precedes my time here too. So. Who was it that was responsible for making sure Bruce didn't do anything stupid?" Jason turned a pointed glare on Dick.

"Nine years ago I wasn't Robin yet either," Dick protested.

"No, but you were here. So was Barbara for that matter." Jason swiveled his head so that he included her. Barbara didn't bother to hide her amusement. "Why didn't either of you say something when Bruce started _dating an assassin?_ Why didn't _Alfred_ say something?"

"To be fair, I was seventeen. I actively avoided any news of Bruce's love life."

"Also to be fair, for all we know, Talia grew him in a test tube or something," Stephanie chipped in.

"Not to suggest anything too radical here, but you could just _talk to Bruce_ ," Barbara pointed out.

"Have you?" Jason demanded.

"No. But since whatever it was is obviously over now, I don't really think it's any of my business."

"I appreciate that."

They all looked up guiltily.

"Hi, Bruce," Stephanie said weakly. "Exactly how much of that did you hear?"

Judging by the look on his face, Tim was going to go with _too much._

* * *

"Father has informed me that I must apologize to you."

Bruce had given them a very tired speech about giving Damian a chance, and since Bruce was swamped with some top secret Justice League thing and some of his old injuries were acting up again to boot, Jason bit back his initial sarcastic response and instead waited politely.

And waited.

And waited.

"Are you planning on doing it now or are you just forewarning me to expect it?" he finally asked.

Damian scowled at him. "I am sorry that I caused you injury sufficient to take you out of the field. Judging by your lack of skill, it would have been more efficient to simply let you out to fight on the streets where your death would at least serve Father's crusade." He shoved past Jason and into the library.

Jason stared at the closed door and forcibly shoved the Pit's whispers back under control. He'd been planning on going in there, but he was pretty sure he'd just changed his mind. "Well, aren't you delightful."

"I know," Tim said from behind him. Jason manfully resisted the urge to jump. "Dick was trying to convince him we were all brothers, and he said I wasn't his brother, I was 'a possibly criminal stalker that Father turned into an irritating resource when Todd was no longer around to fulfill that function.' Not quite as harsh as yours, though. I think he hates you the most."

"I've got a still healing gut wound that says you're right. Speaking of which, I think I'm going to go tell Bruce that next time I can do without the apology."

Tim followed along with him and was kind enough to pretend that it wasn't because Jason had been walking around for too long and looked like he was about to fall over. Jason appreciated that. "If this is what he's like now, he's going to be unbearable on the anniversary next week."

Jason had been trying not to think about that. "Maybe we can convince Bruce to put him up for adoption before then."

"Or," Tim said slowly, "instead of the usual dance of not mentioning it and nobody letting you out of their sight all day, we could just really go all out, so that whatever remarks he makes are just kind of lost in the noise."

Jason looked at him suspiciously. "I know that look. What are you plotting?"

Tim grinned. "Remember how in the second Harry Potter book they threw a deathday party?"

"Bruce would kill us," Jason said in an awed voice. "Let's do it."

* * *

"Jason I understand. _Tim_ I understand. But _you_ , Dick? Really?"

Dick raised his hands defensively. "In my defense, I was a mitigating influence. The original plan was to have food that was actually rotting instead of just tastefully decorated."

Bruce looked around the dining room. It looked like a Halloween themed holiday shop had thrown up on it and was complete with a fog machine. "Dick, I don't think the word tasteful means what you think it means."

Dick grinned. "Inconceivable."

On the bright side, at least Damian seemed sane by comparison.

* * *

"When I said you could use the Cave to train, I didn't mean for you to spend quite so much time down here."

Damian paused in the middle of his exercise and slowly lowered his sword. "I want to remain in condition so that when you remove this ridiculous ban I will be ready."

"Alternatively, you could go easier on your body so that you don't wreck it by the time you turn eighteen."

"Tt. That will not happen. Mother made improvements to make sure of it."

Bruce froze. "Improvements."

"Yes." Damian waved his sword absently.

They'd have to figure out exactly what those were. Ideally, they'd want a full examination, but this went a little outside Dr. Thompkin's expertise.

In the meantime . . . "I'll make you a deal," Bruce said, stepping onto the mat. "I'll spar with you if after that you call it quits for the day."

Damian's eyes widened. "Deal," he said instantly.

* * *

The sparring turned into a daily ritual. It was a hard one to keep, but Bruce stubbornly made time for it. Sparring seemed to be the only time he could reach his son.

"How are you getting along with the others?" he asked as he stretched in preparation. His shoulder, still only half-healed, twinged at the motion.

"Tt." Damian shrugged in seeming unconcern, but his shoulders were tight. "Grayson is annoying, but acceptable enough, I suppose."

"Oh?" Bruce had worried those two would have a problem after how they met.

"He demanded I give another apology to Todd, saying my first was not proper," Damian grumbled. "But he has proven himself an opponent worthy of respect."

"And the others?"

"Drake and Gordon are useful enough, I suppose. Brown is annoyingly cheerful, much as Grayson can be. Todd is inferior. I do not know why you accepted _street trash_ \- "

 _"Damian."_

Damian deflated a bit. "He insulted Mother," he muttered. "She brought him back from his undead state. He has no right to speak of her that way."

"She did," Bruce conceded. "She also hurt him considerably and kept him away from us for nearly two years. That's a hard thing to forgive."

"But - "

The alert he'd set up for Justice League emergencies lit up the screen of every computer in the Cave and began to blare. Bruce ran for the nearest one and punched the sirens off before reading through the message grimly.

"Father?"

He looked up. "I have to go," he said. He hoped his face looked less grim than he felt. "I'm sorry, Damian. I'll make it up to you, I promise. We can finish this conversation when I get back. Tell the others what happened, all right?"

He barely waited for Damian's nodded assent before squeezing his shoulder and running for the zeta tube in the Cave.

* * *

In an ideal world, Dick thought, they'd have been able to stay home and all sit around the television as it played the breaking news of Darkseid's attack and the Justice League's battle against it.

Well, in an ideal world Darkseid wouldn't be attacking and there might not even be a need for the Justice League, but - but the point was, this wasn't either of those worlds, and they had to be out on the streets dealing with the spillover of crazy that was tearing up Gotham. Dick wasn't thrilled with letting Jason out just yet, but Stephanie said he was technically cleared and no one was excited about him patrolling alone under the circumstances, so here they were.

It was all hands on deck for something like this. Even Damian had a job, although his was just to keep an eye on the news reports. Dick had given him a comm to keep them apprised.

"Father's League is victorious," Damian finally announced, three days into the nightmare. "Darkseid is vanquished."

Stephanie let out a whoop in the background. Dick was too tired to manage more than a grin. "Great. I don't suppose it said anything about injuries or clean up, or whatever?" It would be good to have an idea when Bruce would be home.

"It did not," Damian confirmed. "The alien seems surprisingly upset, however."

"Someone must have gotten hurt," Dick said. He bit his lip, considering. "Oracle, Robin, how's it looking out here?"

"Pretty good," Oracle said. "If you want to head in, get some sleep and something to eat, check on the news, now would be a good time to do it."

"And it would free us up to try and find out how B is doing," Robin put in. His voice sounded a little strange, but Dick figured that was probably just exhaustion.

"Please say we're going home, please say we're going home," Flamebird muttered.

"Getting tired, little brother?"

" _Yes_. Of your _smell._ The rain last night did _not_ wash off that sewer scent."

Dick laughed. "Okay. Expect us in ten."

* * *

The first couple of hours at home were pretty much exactly what he was expecting. Food. Shower. Nap. Quietly pointed lectures from Alfred. Another nap.

Getting woken up by a sickly stiff Damian was less expected.

"Little D?" he asked blearily.

"Do not call me that," he snapped. "Get up. Drake has announced that the Kryptonian is approaching at some speed. Your presence is required." He paused for a moment. "Do we have kryptonite? The others won't tell me."

"We don't need it. Supes is a friend." He shoved himself out of bed. "Come on."

If Bruce had been with Clark, Tim would have mentioned.

That meant Bruce was the one hurt then. Possibly in the Watchtower's medbay, possibly somewhere else. Dick shoved some shoes on, just in case. He wanted to be able to get to Bruce as fast as possible.

Dick gathered with the others at the front door.

Normally, for the sake of secrecy, Clark tried to land with some subtlety. Today, he crashed down right in the front lawn.

They poured outside. "What's happened?" Tim demanded. "Where is he?"

But Dick had already seen Clark's face.

Dick knew.

"He's gone," Clark said hoarsely.

"Impossible," Damian said immediately. "Father wouldn't - he couldn't - " He was swaying slightly, and Dick automatically reached out to steady him. Hands on both shoulders, not really sure if it was for Damian's support or his own.

Stephanie had gone white and sat down, right in the middle of the lawn. Barbara -

Barbara was right behind him, her hand on his back. He leaned into it as much as he dared, afraid that if he did more, he'd fall apart. The others couldn't afford for him to fall apart.

Jason's hands were clenching and unclenching, like he was looking for something to punch and seriously considering Superman, which was a bad idea and Dick should tell him to stop.

He would, just as soon as he found his voice again.

Alfred. Alfred hadn't poured out with them. Someone would have to tell Alfred.

Dick felt sick at the thought.

But Tim - Tim wasn't pale, or trembling, or angry. Tim was just very firmly shaking his head. "No. I don't believe it. Where's the body? I want to see the body."

Clark winced. "Tim, I don't think - " He swallowed hard. "There's not much left."

"Then what makes you so sure it's him?" Tim shot back. "I want to run tests."

"We ran them already. That's why it took so long. We had to - We had to be sure."

"I want to run them," Tim repeated. "We've had one resurrection already, I'm not burying anyone else until I am _personally convinced they're dead."_

Dick finally found his voice. "No," he said, stepping forward. He let go of Damian so he could grab Tim's shoulder. "You want them run again, fine. I'll run them. You're not going near it."

Tim turned on him, eyes blazing. "Why not?"

emNot much left./em All the gruesome pictures that could mean danced through his head and the sick feeling was stronger than ever. "Because there's some things you shouldn't have to see," he said firmly. He turned to Clark. "Thank you for coming to tell us."

He had to say Jason's name twice to get his attention when it was time to head back inside.

* * *

There was no funeral for Bruce Wayne.

There would be, eventually, but Gordon had raised the point that they didn't want people associating the two deaths by announcing them at the same time, and Grayson had agreed.

Of course, they hadn't exactly _announced_ Batman's death, but there were already rumors according to the others.

So they had said that Father had simply gone on a - a trip and in a month or two they would reveal the fact that he would not be coming back.

There had already been a memorial for Batman held quietly by the Justice League. They had all gone in costume, Damian in his old League uniform and with a borrowed mask to hide his face.

"He saved the world," Superman had said, and yes, they all _knew_ that, that was what Father _did_ , but what was the _point_ if it meant he wasn't going to come back and finish their sparring session like he _promised -_

Damian decapitated the training dummy and whirled to start on another one.

Father was supposed to come back. Father always came back.

If Damian had been there, like he ought to have been, then maybe he could have done something instead of uselessly watching the news -

The training dummy fell, to the floor in five pieces. Damian grabbed one, spun around, and flung it at the wall.

It hit two feet from Todd's head. Not that he cared.

Judging from Todd's clothing, he'd come down here with a similar idea to Damian. He had the same fire simmering beneath all his movements.

"I was here first," Damian said.

Todd looked pointedly around at the huge space, and for a moment Damian thought he was going to make a Grayson-like comment about sharing, but then he said something infinitely better.

"Fight you for it?"

 _Yes._ A fight was exactly what he needed. "You will lose," he warned. "Again."

Todd smiled at him, slow and sharp. "Oh, I think you'll be surprised. Hand to hand?"

"Of course." Damian sheathed his sword and set it aside.

It started as a careful dance around each other, deciding when to strike, but they were both burning too fiercely for strategy today. Damian leaped at him with a battle cry.

The next few minutes were glorious. Blood pounding in his veins, on his knuckles, in his teeth. Pain all over his skin and deep in his muscles and not in his chest where it had been nesting. It wasn't sparring like he'd done with Father, it was an all out brawl, and Damian felt better then he had since they got the news.

"What are you doing?" Grayson's horrified voice cut through the haze of blood.

Todd slowly rolled off him. Damian reluctantly let go of his death grip on the old wound on Todd's arm.

"No, seriously, what were you doing?" Grayson demanded.

Damian's eyes cut to Todd, suddenly afraid. If Todd claimed he'd attacked him again, Grayson would probably believe him, and Father wasn't here to listen to his side of the story now. But if he got his own version out first -

Todd still beat him to it. "Sparring," he said easily, rolling to his feet. "Weren't we, Little D?"

Damain's mouth twisted at the use of the name. He barely permitted it from Grayson, much less Todd. Still, it strengthened the facade of friendliness, so he just nodded. "Yes. Sparring."

"That was not sparring. That was - " Grayson ran his hand through his hair. "Jason, you've been out of control on patrol since - "

"Since Bruce died," Todd snarled. "Stop dancing around it and just say it."

"Since Bruce died," Grayson conceded quietly. "I can't keep letting this go on. Maybe you should take some time off."

"Letting me?" Todd laughed. It was a far harsher sound that his usual one. "Letting me? I'm nineteen now. I'm going to college in a couple of months. You don't _let_ me do anything."

Grayson's face stiffened. "It's my job to look after you."

"No, it's Bruce's job, only he's not here anymore, is he?"

"I'm not losing you again!" Grayson shouted.

"That's not your choice!" Todd shouted back.

The room fell into a shattered silence, and Damian stood frozen in the middle of it, trying to figure out what had just happened.

Grayson had gone very pale. "Jason - _Jay_ \- " He reached a hand out desperately.

Todd scrubbed a hand over his face. "I didn't mean that. You know I didn't mean that."

Grayson looked like he'd like very much to believe that.

"Look, you have your unhealthy coping mechanisms and I have mine. It'll be fine."

"Okay, Jay," he said quietly. "Damian? How about you? How are you holding up?"

"I am fine."

Todd snorted.

"I _am."_

"Do you want to talk about it?" Grayson asked tentatively.

"Tt. I am not a child."

"Obviously not," Todd agreed. "Nine is the height of maturity."

"Not helping, Jason," Grayson muttered.

"And I am no longer nine in any case," Damian informed him. "I am now ten."

They both turned to stare at him. "When did that happen?" Todd demanded.

"A week ago."

"You should have told us!" Grayson said. "I'm sorry, I didn't meant to just ignore it - "

"Tt. I would have informed you had I wished for acknowledgement. Other things seemed more important." If Father had been here, it would have been different.

But Father wasn't here.

"Why did you come down here originally, Grayson? Surely our sparring match was not audible upstairs."

"What? Oh. No." Grayson was still frowning at him. "Tim's got something he wants to show us."

Grayson seemed concerned by whatever it was. Damian did not particularly care about whatever Drake had discovered, but at least it had the potential to be distra- interesting.

* * *

The presentation had been full of science that Damian had barely heard of. He scowled to cover his ignorance.

The gist of it, he gathered, was that there were some oddities in the weapon that Darkseid had used against Father that Drake thought to be significant.

Judging by the expressions on Todd, Grayson, and Brown's faces, that was all they'd been able to gather too, and possibly not even that much. It was, as always, impossible to guess what Pennyworth was thinking, but Gordon looked like she'd grasped more of it.

"So what do you think the weapon actually did?" she asked.

Drake pointed at her. "Good question. So, as we know, the weapon appeared to just let loose a big stream of fire."

"Which it did," Grayson put in.

"Which it did," Drake conceded, "but if that was all it did, then there's a bunch of - " He saw the looks on their faces and changed his wording, something Damian resented the necessity of. "A bunch of weird energy floating around for no real purpose. You don't need arcane energy to start a fire. You just don't. So what did it do?"

"Something to help Darkseid come back?" Brown hazarded.

"Good thought, but no. The energy was directed forward, towards Bruce, not back. So if we assume that the inconsistencies on the body mean that it wasn't actually Bruce - "

"Tim, we've been through this. There's no reason to assume some elaborate cloning conspiracy just because the fire damage messed with a few - "

Drake rolled right over Grayson. "If we assume that, then we have to ask the question: Where did Bruce go? There was no time for him to leave on his own or to be taken by something else."

"Okay, I'll bite," Todd said. "You think the weird energy did something."

"Right. I couldn't figure out what from just looking at the energy, so I looked at it from a purpose driven perspective. What could the energy have done to have removed him so completely?"

"Transported him," Brown suggested.

"Possibility one," Drake agreed.

"It could have just vaporized him, Tim," Gordon said gently.

"It could have, but then why provide us with a body? Closure?" Drake scoffed.

He did have a point there.

"Transfiguration of some sort, then," Gordon said.

"Possible," Drake said. "Although again, I'm not sure what the point would be. You're all missing the final point."

The room was silent.

Drake sighed. "Time travel."

"Time travel," Damian scoffed.

Grayson winced. "It's happened to the Justice League before," he admitted. "Although there's no real reason to think it happened here. Unless you matched the energy up?"

Drake grimaced. "Unfortunately, the energy readings are still outside our frame of reference. I just don't know. Which is why I've spent the last few days searching for any possible clues as to where - and when - he is."

"That sounds a rather monumental task," Pennyworth said cautiously.

"It was," Drake admitted. "But since I decided time travel was more likely given the uniqueness of the readings, I was able to focus on history, and from there I was able to write some computer programs to help, and, well, here." He pulled out a timeline. "Before written history, so we're not sure of the exact dates, there's a tribe of people where Gotham now stands that painted pictures of their heroes on cave walls. Most of them have animal motifs. One of which, it's recently been discovered, is a bat. 1202. Sir Richard Wayne becomes known as the knight of the bat. He gains fame for a series of good deeds although he admits in a private letter that the first few were not done by him but rather inspired him. 1524. Marie Barreau - this would be the Barreaus that eventually married into the Wayne family - is accused of being a witch and is narrowly rescued by what contemporary accounts describe as a "horrid familiar with the head of a man and the wings of a bat.""

They waited for him to continue. When he didn't, Grayson said gently, "I know you've done a lot of work on this, but Tim, Bruce isn't the first person in the history of the world to use a bat symbol."

"And Father did not have wings," Damian put in. His mind had stuck on that detail for some reason.

Drake had the nerve to roll his eyes. "Of course he doesn't have wings, but he's not a witch's familiar, either. They wanted to phrase it up to sound better than "some guy in a bat costume.""

"If even you think the account's not wholly accurate, what makes you so sure any of it is?" Gordon asked. She was using the gentle voice too. Damian wished they would all stop. It was getting on his nerves, and he wasn't even the one it was directed at.

"Because it makes sense!" Drake's frustration finally burst outward. "Bruce isn't dead, so he has to be somewhere, and if he is lost in the time stream, these are exactly the sort of things he would do!"

That was true, Damian admitted. Father would not stop his crusade for something as small as getting sent back in time.

But Grayson was correct too. Father had been the greatest man to use the bat but not the first.

"Tim." Grayson's voice was even more irritatingly gentle. "I'm sorry. I should have stepped in earlier. I was just trying to give you time to bring it up. I know that this has hit you harder than any of us, and I know the timing was terrible, but - "

"Wait, what?" Todd said. "You literally just walked in on Damian and I pounding each other's faces in."

"And I don't think there's ever a good time for this," Brown added.

"Yes. Why would Drake be the most affected?"

Drake had gone white. "Don't you dare make this about that, Dick," he hissed. "Don't you dare. You shouldn't even know about that."

Grayson raised his hands placatingly. "I didn't mean to find it. I just stumbled across it by accident, I swear."

"Found what?" Gordon looked alarmed at the thought of something she didn't know.

Damian wished they'd stop dancing around whatever it was. "Does Drake have some form of terminal illness?"

"No," Drake bit out. He glared at Grayson for a long moment before throwing his hands up. "My parents are dead, okay? Their plane crashed. The coverage was buried under all the stuff about Darkseid's attack. I only know because I got a call from one of their lawyers. I guess they never took me out of their will. They're dead, Bruce is not, can we move on to the part of that sentence that actually matters?"

Damian had forgotten that Drake's parents were still alive. Had been alive. The file had said they had lost custody due to neglect. Damian had noted it as a potential psychological weakness and moved on. He'd certainly had no idea they were now dead.

Judging from the stunned silence in the rest of the room, Grayson had been the only one to figure it out.

"When did you find out?" Todd choked out.

"Why didn't you tell us?" Brown demanded.

"Oh, Master Timothy."

"I found out just a few hours before we found out about Bruce, alright? You were still out on patrol when I found out, and then Bruce was in trouble, and it _doesn't matter._ They never wanted me when I was alive, it makes no difference that they're dead." His voice shook on the last words.

So that was why Drake was so determined that Father not be dead. Damian felt obscurely betrayed. He'd hoped that Drake was onto something, but he saw now why Grayson had dismissed the theory. Drake was clearly snapping under the weight of his grief.

Drake tried to plow forward. "If all these incidents are him, then he's clearly going either forward or backward in time. Or I suppose he could be bouncing around randomly. Obviously, we'd prefer the first option, but without more detail it's impossible to say. Ideally, we'd also know how long he was staying in each time and what, if anything, causes him to move again. I've found as much as I can online, so the next obvious step is to go the place in question. Unfortunately, Marie's hometown now contains one of Ra's compounds, so there'll be some danger . . . " He trailed off. "And none of you believe me, do you?" He laughed bitterly. "This, this is why I didn't tell you. Now you just all think I'm crazy."

"I believe you," Todd said.

All eyes turned to Todd.

"You do?" Drake sounded stunned.

"Look, it's a thin lead, I get it, but - The wrong flowers were on my grave. That's the definition of a thin lead, but if someone had followed it, I might have been back a year sooner. No one did, fine, I don't blame you. I probably wouldn't have followed that lead. But if Bruce hadn't picked up my call, if he hadn't believed it . . . Look, I'm here because he followed an unlikely lead. If he's calling for help, I've got to try and answer."

"And if the clues were leading anywhere else I might think it was at least worth a shot, but Tim d _ust said_ this'll lead you right to Ra's doorstep. Ra's as in the guy who runs the organization that's sent so many people after us in the last year that we'e literally stopped keeping track."

Todd shrugged. "So we've got practice fending them off. We'll be fine."

"Tim's not even supposed to be fighting yet!" Dick exploded. "And you've seen how Gotham's been since Batman stopped patrolling it. I need you out there, Jason, not out on a wild goose chase! I can't do this alone, and frankly, after what we just talked about down in the Cave, you've got no business going off alone either!"

Todd's jaw clenched. "So put on the cowl. Be Batman. I'm going. I'm nineteen. You can't stop me, and you can't stop Tim without revealing his guardian's dead and stepping in. I'm old enough to get us anything he can't."

"We should at least slow down and plan this more," Gordon tried.

"We don't know how much time Bruce has," Drake argued. "If he's going backward in time, then I don't want to think about what will happen when he can't go back any further."

"Grandfather is furious with all of you," Damian put in. "If you get that close to him, he will kill you."

Grayson looked sick. "Please. Just - Tim, you know he wouldn't want this. He wouldn't want either of you to get yourselves killed over this, and he'd kill us all if he thought we were going to go let you fight the League of Shadows when you're not even eighteen yet. You're still in school, for goodness sakes. You don't even have a non-civilian identity to fight under yet. Tim Drake has no reason to be interested in Batman."

"Final exams are done so school's basically over anyway, I can just get them to ship my diploma, Ra's knows anyways, and besides. Tim Drake might not have a reason but Robin does."

Three was a terrible desperate fire in Grayson's eyes that Damian had never seen before and that he hated Drake for putting there. "I may not be able to stop Tim Drake from going to France. But I can tell you right now, Robin's not."

Drake jerked back like he'd been slapped. Brown and Todd hissed.

"Master Richard - "

"Dick - " Gordon said at the same time.

"I don't want to lose you, Tim," Grayson said hoarsely. "But if I can't stop you, I can at least not help you get yourself killed."

"Fine," Drake said tightly. "Fine. I'll figure something else out. But I'm going." He took a deep breath. "Steph?"

Brown bit her lip. "I don't know if you're right, but I don't think you're crazy. I just also don't think Mom's going to let me go to Europe with two teenage boys."

"Fair enough." He bit his lip. "Sorry."

She smiled at him weakly. "Just come back."

"If he gets that close to Grandfather, there is little chance of that. Grandfather likes to summer there. He will likely be right there."

"Thanks for the warning," Todd said dryly, pushing himself to his feet. "Maybe I can finally punch Ra's in the face. I've been wanting to do that for years." He nodded to the room. "See you soon. I hope."

* * *

The house was quieter with the others gone.

Damian did not miss them, of course, although the loss of Todd as a sparring partner was unfortunate. He did not appreciate the change in atmosphere, however. Pennyworth, who had previously looked agelessly superhuman, now appeared troublingly weary and it was beginning to impede his previously impeccable service. Gordon, grown used to an assistant, was struggling to keep up an eye on all the things she needed to.

And it didn't take Brown's dire mutterings to know that Grayson was getting injured at an unacceptable rate even now that he'd taken up the cowl.

He knew all this because he had decided to take advantage of his father's permission to train whenever he liked to train while Grayson was on patrol. This had earned him a few sideways looks from Brown but apparently she had decided his presence was acceptable because the looks had turned unnecessarily sympathetic and she hadn't said anything.

They were halfway to the original return date they'd set for Father's return from his trip. Or rather, the date they'd be announcing he would not be returning. Grayson had quietly agonized over it before extending the date. Presumably a concession to Drake and Todd. Damian wasn't sure why he bothered, but he . . . appreciated the extra time.

He examined the new date on the calendar. "What happens to me when Father is officially declared dead? Will you send me back?" He tried to keep his voice steady. He was not . . . ready to go back. Not yet.

"Oh, Damian, no." Grayson sat in the chair next to him and leaned forward. "No, Bruce planned ahead. You know how he - was."

Damian nodded. Father had always had a plan. "What was the plan?"

"He - " Grayson swallowed. "He asked me, if anything happened, to - adopt you. So that you wouldn't have to go back."

Damian considered this. Grayson was an excellent warrior and, so far, a more or less acceptable wearer of the cowl. He treated Damian with respect, that ridiculous nickname aside, and despite his own grief, he had shown concern for Damian over the past few weeks. He certainly would have sufficient material goods to provide for them both after his inheritance. He would be a good teacher and an adequate guardian. "That is acceptable."

"Good." Grayson looked relieved. "Listen, I know I haven't been checking on you like I probably should have been - "

"If you are referring to my emotional state, then I am fine. If you are referring to my educational progress, then Pennyworth informs me that my progress on the online courses is more than adequate. I would, however, appreciate the chance to spar with you."

"Before patrol tonight," Grayson promised. "For right now, I got you this. I'm sorry I missed it earlier." He held out a brightly colored box.

Damian opened it curiously. An outrageously colored confection with an even more ridiculous novelty candle sat inside. "What."

"It's from the sweets shop Bruce always used to take me to," Grayson explained. "He'd make me promise not to tell Alfred. Happy belated birthday, Dami."

He stared at the cupcake. "Oh." He removed it carefully and took a small, suspicious bite. Flavor burst on his tongue. " . . . It is acceptable," he admitted reluctantly. "But that nickname is no better than the last one."

Grayson let out a small, tired laugh. "Whatever you say, Little D."

* * *

Between Grayson's nightly activities as Batman, daily activities as a police detective, his continuing relationship with Gordon, and the fact that Grayson did, in fact, have to occasionally slow down long enough to sleep, Damian had assumed that their interactions would continue to be limited, aside from the daily sparring matches Grayson had agreed to.

Instead, Grayson, already all but living in the manor, made the move official and made it a point to eat at last one meal a day with Damian. Gordon joined them about half the time, and Damian supposed that from the outside, they must appear to be almost a normal family.

Tt. Normal was undesirable.

The meals, at least, were bearable, and the sparring sessions were appreciated.

Grayson's attempts to institute a weekly game night was less so, although Damian had to admit to a secret fondness for Risk. Partly for the strategy required and partly for the amusement afforded by the growing concern on Brown's face as she watched him win it.

Candyland was nothing short of nightmarish, and Damian could only assume that Grayson was punishing him for some offense he was unaware of committing.

If Grayson chose to abolish game night, then, Damian would not protest. Still. He suspected Father would have approved of it, since he had been so insistent on providing Damian with something that at least bore passing resemblance to a normal childhood, and the practice was not _completely_ abhorrent.

And if Grayson had decided to give up on it, he could at least have the courtesy to inform Damian in person instead of leaving him to wait in the designated room as half an hour slowly passed.

If Gordon or Brown had also been there, he would have told one of them to come get him when Grayson finally deigned to show up and gone to do something actually productive with his time, but both were elsewhere tonight. Pennyworth had left the customary refreshments in the room at the beginning of the time and had not yet come to replenish them.

Damian considered his options. Perhaps . . . perhaps he ought to go and check on Grayson. If the man had forgotten their appointment or was playing some obscure joke on him, he could plan an appropriate revenge. If he was in difficulty - if Grandfather had sent more reminders of his displeasure, for instance - then Damian could be of assistance and further prove his worth.

Satisfied with this plan, he slipped out of the room and began his search.

Grayson was not on duty, and he would have been informed if the man had needed to leave the manor for any reason. Grayson always made a point of it. He could be down in the Cave, caught up in work, however, or in any number of his usual haunts.

He would start with his haunts in the manor. The Cave he would save for last.

Unfortunately, Grayson was not in any of his usual haunts. Nor was he in the Cave. Now growing concerned, Damian considered enlisting Pennyworth but decided against it. He did not wish to be seen as alarmed. He would simply check room by room until he found him.

It wasn't until he reached Father's study, a room he had thought Grayson avoided, that he saw a light under the door. He pushed it open cautiously.

Grayson sat slumped over the desk, a position that would have been more alarming if not for his faint snores. A promising looking game box emblazoned with the word "clue" was tilted on the desk in front of him. Evidently he had not intended to miss their appointment.

Damian crept forward. He knew how crucial it was that they all maintain proper sleep schedules. Perhaps he should wake him?

He froze. Something glistened on Grayson's face. Something that started from his eyes.

Damian quietly retreated from the room and turned the light off as he went.

They could play the game at another time.

* * *

Grayson looked absolutely miserable the next morning. Damian assumed at least half of that was from a sore neck and that another large portion was due to guilt for missing patrol the night before.

"Dami, I'm so sorry about last night. I was going through some things in Bruce's office, and I fell asleep. I didn't mean to skip out on you."

"I am aware. You may make it up to me by letting me choose the next game after we finish this "Clue" of yours."

Grayson looked relieved to be so easily forgiven. "Sure. Any game you want."

"Excellent. We will be playing Go. The winner claims the loser's share of Pennyworth's cookies for two weeks."

Grayson appeared nervous. "I, er, don't actually know how to play Go, Damian."

"Unfortunately for you, seeing as I am excellent at it. I suggest you brush up before our match."

* * *

Grayson was injured for the third time that week. Damian stood before him, arms crossed, as Brown stitched him up grimly.

"You require assistance out there."

"I'm not exactly spoiled for choice here, Little D. Don't worry about it. I'll be fine."

"I would make an excellent source of assistance."

"No." Grayson's voice was firmer than he'd ever heard it.

"I am well trained and in good condition. You yourself praised my abilities in our last match."

"You are not going out on the streets, Damian, and that's final."

"Why?" he demanded. "I have heard the stories. I know you campaigned to go out when you were younger and less trained than I was. Surely you do not believe me to be that much less competent than your younger self."

Grayson sighed. "Have you ever heard of Speedy? Aqualad? Wonder Girl? Hawk?"

"No. What do these people have to do with anything?"

Grayson leaned forward. "They were all on the Teen Titans back when I wanted to join."

"I assume they failed to win much glory if I have never heard of them."

Grayson's mouth twisted bitterly. "Speedy - Roy Harper? An undercover mission he was on went wrong, and he ended up addicted to drugs. No one's seen him in years. Aqualad's dead now. So's Wonder Girl. Hawk went evil _then_ died. So no, you haven't heard about them. What about Pantha? Jericho? Terra?"

"No," Damian said. He had a feeling he knew where this was going.

"They were all members when Jason wanted to join. They're all dead now too. Now, as far as I know, Tim never asked, but when he was first eligible, there was Superboy, and the new Hawk, and Power Boy - "

"Let me guess," Damian said dully. "They're all dead now too."

"To be fair, a couple of them came back," Brown pointed out.

"And then half of them turned right around and died again," Grayson countered. "That's not going to be you, Damian. This family's lost enough people."

"Fine," Damian bit out. "But you need a partner. Perhaps Todd could come back," he allowed.

Grayson shook his head wearily. "I haven't heard a thing from them."

"You haven't?" Brown asked, startled. "Tim and I have been trading calls since they left."

"They're all right?" Grayson asked in relief.

"Still alive," she assured him.

"They're safe?" he pressed.

She winced. "Still alive," she repeated.

Grayson groaned.

Gordon wheeled over. "If all this had just waited a year, I might have been able to be of more help. As it is . . . "

Grayson looked up. "What do you mean?"

She sighed. "I was going to tell you this ages ago, but with everything that happened it just never seemed like the right time. There's a new procedure. They think - " She swallowed. "They think I might be able to walk again. I've got an appointment in a couple of weeks. I'll need months of physical therapy of course, but . . . "

"Babs, that's great!" Grayson leaped off the counter and swept in for a kiss. "That's incredible!"

"And not much help right now," she reminded him, though she had still had a smile lingering on her mouth. She shot a considering look at Damian. "If you really want to help, Damian, I could at least start training you to hack."

"Bruce didn't want him to start on that till he was twelve," Dick protested.

"There's a lot of things Bruce didn't want," Stephanie pointed out.

"I want to learn," Damian put in eagerly.

Dick gave in. "Alright." He held up his hands. "Alright. Fine. Bruce would have murdered us all, but - fine."

* * *

"Until you get better at the technical aspects, I'll just set you up on observation during patrols."

Damian's lip curled at the reminder that he was now mere technical staff, but he nodded anyway. It was better than nothing.

"You'll need a code name for the comm."

That surprised him. "Is the traditional name of Robin not acceptable?"

Gordon frowned. "It's not quite a tradition. Jason went by Jay, for instance, short for Bluejay. Tim only took up the name because we were having trouble finding suitable alternatives, so Dick made a gift of the name."

The name had been Grayson's first, and it would irritate Drake to have it taken. Drake, who was the reason Grayson constantly frowned at the phone and jumped half-hopefully, half-fearfully whenever it rang.

"I want Robin," he said firmly. "If Grayson will allow it."

Gordon pursed her lips but nodded and tapped her comm. "Bats, our new baby bird has requested permission to fly under the handle of Robin. Thoughts?"

The comm was silent for a worrying moment. "Yeah," Grayson finally said. Damian let out his breath. "Every Batman needs a Robin."

* * *

When nearly all of Arkham broke out a few days later, however, even Robin didn't seem like enough.

Grayson stared at the television where the news was just breaking. The names of the inmates who had escaped rolled across the bottom of the screen.

Joker. Harley Quinn. Poison Ivy. Scarecrow. Two-Face.

All out in the city. All ready to make trouble.

"You are not going out in that alone," he said flatly. He had seen the footage. He had read the reports. He had no confidence that if Grayson tried to fix this alone that he would return alive.

"Not much choice," Grayson said with forced flippancy. "It'll be fine. B managed them alone for years."

"Not all in one night, he didn't," Gordon said. "You're taking help."

Grayson threw his hands up. "What do you want me to do, call Superman?"

"If I didn't know for a fact that he was off planet at the moment, I wouldn't be against it, but no." Gordon raised her voice. "Steph, come on in."

Brown entered the room. She was not in her usual civilian clothes, nor in the purple costume he had seen pictures of in his mother's files.

She was wearing black body armor, a black cape lined with purple, and a mask that had two pointed ears.

"No," Grayson said instantly. "You're seventeen."

"Better than ten," Brown said. Damian scowled at her. "And better than you winding up dead in a Gotham gutter."

Grayson turned on Gordon. "You're all right with this?" he demanded.

"I'm not happy about the necessity," she admitted, "but I do think it's a necessity. I've been worried about this possibility for a while, so I prepared a contingency. I've been helping with her training."

Grayson put his head in his hands. "Bruce is _rolling in his grave."_

"Does that mean you're cool with this?" Brown asked nervously.

"No. Not at all." Grayson sighed. "But I don't have any better ideas, so let's do it anyway. To the Batmobile, Spoiler."

"Batgirl," she corrected. "I wanted something less tied to my father, so Barbara said - And that doesn't really matter right now. Let's go."

"If Brown is going," Damian began.

"No," the others said instantly.

"Fine," he sulked. "Good hunting, Batman. Fatgirl."

"Exactly the kind of maturity that'll convince us to give more responsibility," Gordon said dryly. "Good luck to both of you." She smiled at them both, but her expression dropped to concern the second they were out the door. "I'm heading down to the Cave too," she said. "Would you grab Alfred on your way down? I want him manning the med station tonight."

"I thought the whole point of this was to make sure Grayson didn't get hurt," he protested.

Gordon let out a laugh that had none of her usual warmth or amusement. "Kid, we'll be lucky if they both don't get _killed."_

"Oh." He felt the sudden irrational urge to run after them.

Gordon's expression softened. She put a hand on his elbow. He jerked his arm away. "I'm just antsy because of the Joker. Don't worry about it. They'll both be fine."

Somehow her earlier statement was far more convincing than the latter.

* * *

The first night after the breakout, Brown came home with a long gash in her right arm, bruises all up one side of her face, and a black eye. Grayson was favoring his left side and had an angry red mark on his other arm from where he'd had to push Brown out of the way of one of Ivy's plants. Damian's doubts about Brown intensified.

The second night, she redeemed herself by dragging back Grayson when he was dosed up on fear toxin. She'd already administered the antidote, but it was a new compound, and he was still screaming.

Damian tried without much success to forget the sound of those screams.

The third night they didn't actually make it to nightfall before they had to hit the streets once more, exhausted, injured, and shaken. Quinn and Two-Face were back in Arkham but the rest were still out there, and their plans had finally been put into full play.

Damian stared at his designated streets. The police were waging war against Ivy's plants and trying to contain a mass of people who had been hit with Joker gas and fear toxin. All of that was old news. There was no need to report on it.

Not when Oracle was busy snapping out instructions and information for Batman and Batgirl who were right in the epicenter of it.

"Batman, that blow cracked your mask, you need to fall back _now_. Batgirl, cover him. Robin, I'm transferring the rescue bats to your controls. Give them more cover."

He took control of the automated bats and flew them in a protective formation. It was nearly impossible to keep them out of reach of Ivy's grasping vines.

"I said _get out of there_ \- Batgirl can get the hostages, now _get out_ \- Nightwing, Nightwing listen to me. The fear toxin is getting to you. I need you to listen to me. Everything will be fine if you just swing over to that alley and get out. _No,_ Robin and Flamebird are not trapped in there, no Robin is in there - "

"I am here," Damian said through the inexplicable tightness in his throat. "Do not be an idiot. Listen to Oracle."

"I'm on him," Brown said. "I'll drag him back if I - "

There was a terrible scream and then a screech as the comm went out.

"One of the vines ripped through my formation," Damian said tightly. "I've lost my last bat."

Oracle was staring at the screen. Her hand was white on the mouse.

"I have to go after them." Damian pushed himself back from the table.

"The last time I sent someone under eighteen out there, this happened," Gordon said. "The time before that, Tim nearly died, and that was just against the Joker. If we go out there, we're probably not coming back."

"I don't care!" Damian snapped. "I'm not leaving him!" He stormed over to the equipment bay. His swords, he would need his swords - Wait. "We?"

Gordon was already gearing up herself. "I'm driving."

"I'm an excellent driver."

"I really don't care. I'm driving. Alfred?"

Pennyworth was already in her seat. "Ready and waiting, Miss Gordon."

"Good. Damian, grab what you need and try not to die. If we do, Bruce is going to make both of our afterlives miserable."

* * *

The good news was, Pennyworth informed them over the comms, that the criminals had started fighting amongst themselves over who got to claim the Bats as a prize.

The less positive news was that Ivy was currently winning, and the two were deep in the street she'd all but turned into a jungle.

Gordon's plan, that she go in as a distraction while Damian snuck into the maze of plants to find Grayson and Brown, was so far working satisfactorily. He could hear muffled shouting through the vines, and he'd been able to sneak over and above them, careful not to touch.

There were two bundles dangling from the taller vines just up ahead. Both were dead silent.

Damian stalked forward, ducking under the searching tendrils of the guard vines.

If whatever these plants were held some kind of poison, Grayson was in trouble. He'd been hit with fear gas twice in the last two days, and Damian didn't like to think of what the third component would do to his system. Brown, at least, was starting from a stronger place.

There was no good way to cut them down. If he sawed carefully through the tendrils, the plants would be alerted to his presence. He would simply have to cut through the strands holding them up as quickly as possible and hope the fall did them no permanent damage.

He took a few steps backward so that he'd have room for a running jump and _leaped._

The sword sliced neatly through both vines. The vine bundles dropped to the ground with a slightly alarming thud.

Hopefully Gordon was keeping Ivy well occupied. Damian raced over to the nearest bundle. His sword would be awkward for his purpose, so he pulled a batarang from his belt and began sawing through the vines.

Grayson's was first. He was shivering, even in the summer heat, and his skin was feverish. Damian dragged him from the remnants of the vines and hurried to the next one. He had to get Brown. If she was awake, she could help him.

He was only halfway through sawing through the vines when he was interrupted.

"And who are you?" a curious voice said.

Damian whirled, swords ready.

Ivy was swinging gently from one of her vines. "I thought perhaps one of the missing bats would finally come out and face their failure to confront the true problems of this city, but I never expected a new one."

"I am your worst nightmare," he snapped. "Now leave, before I do something that Batman would disapprove of."

She laughed. "Bats don't kill, baby bird. And you wouldn't even have the chance to."

The plants around them came to life. Vines swung at him with thorns beaded with some form of poison. Branches reached out with jagged limbs.

Damian leaped and twisted over them all to take a protective stance over Grayson and Brown. The latter, at least, seemed to be awake. She had managed to grasp the batarang and was sawing her own way out of the trap. Good.

A branch shot towards them. He lopped it off and spun, ducked under a lashing vine, cut off the length of another -

The whole world was a maddening mass of writhing green, and he danced through it with steel as his mother had taught him with the acrobatics Grayson had taught and the determination of his father.

"I made a promise to the Batman," he shouted to her. "I will not kill any vigilante in this city. He said nothing about you."

He would not lose anyone else. He would do this, he would do this -

Ivy's laugh shivered in his ear. "What a fierce little bird you are." Her lips pressed against his temple.

The kiss felt as cool as ice. There was no real need to keep fighting, was there? He ought to just lie down. Wait for the sun to rise.

"No!" Damian shouted. He swung his sword around, but Ivy was already gone.

"Rest, little bird. It is the winter of the bats. Sleep like my plants do and wait to see if you will rise again in the spring."

"Never." He lunged forward, but Ivy's voice seemed to come from everywhere. He couldn't see her.

He couldn't see anything but green.

"Stay away from him!" Brown shouted. Was she out of her bindings yet? He didn't know. It was hard to care.

"You're as weak as a new sprout," Ivy laughed. "Your days of hindering my efforts are over. Even Batman - " Her voice cut off. Was she surprised? She sounded oddly surprised.

"Stay away from my Robin," Grayson growled. Even weakened and shaky, the words were fierce. Something thudded to the ground.

"Batman?" Damian called. Maybe he should sit down. Lie down even.

"Easy, Robin. I've got you, I've got you. Shh, little brother, you did well." Grayson's arms wrapped around him as he eased his way to the ground. "Batgirl?"

"I've got something for him," Brown assured him. "I've got something for you too, seeing as you only waited for me to inject _half of the anti-toxin."_

"Ivy?" Damian asked sleepily.

"I got her," Grayson promised. Something pinched Damian's arm. "Everything's fine now. Batgirl - "

"Stay with him and secure Ivy. I'll go help Oracle."

"Thank you. See? Everything's going to be alright."

* * *

Damian woke up in the Cave. Grayson was sitting beside him with his head in his hands.

He looked up the instant Damian shifted on the bed. "Never do that again," he said hoarsely.

"Next time, I suppose I should just leave you and Brown to die then?" he snapped. He'd thought . . . He'd hoped . . .

Grayson sighed. "I didn't mean it like that. I'm sorry. You just - scared me. Scared all of us. Ivy's poison was pretty toxic this time. We thought you might not wake up."

Oh.

"You did well, though, Dami." Grayson's voice was gentle. "Thank you."

Damian nodded stiffly. Of course he had come. It was his duty.

And he wasn't going to let anyone else die.

"While we're on the topic, though, I heard what you said to Ivy. We don't kill, Damian. Ever."

"I will not," Damian promised. "Unless it is absolutely necessary."

Grayson bit back an argument and shook his head. "We'll work on it."

Damian brightened. "I get to go back in the field?"

"Sure . . . in about eight years. In the meantime, I brought this." Grayson held up a brightly boxed game of Candyland.

"I thought I burned that," Damian blurted out. "I mean. I thought it was lost."

"It was," Grayson said cheerfully. "I bought a new one."

 _"Why?"_ Damian demanded.

"I think you'll like this one better. It's the Gotham version. The candy's been poisoned by the Joker, and the tokens are little vigilantes racing to stop him from giving it out."

. . . Damian had to admit to at least some small appeal. "I want the Batman token."

"Don't you think I should get it since I'm technically - "

"Grayson, if I am going to play this ridiculous game with you, I am going to do it with at least a modicum of dignity. I demand the Batman token."

* * *

It was, Damian later admitted to himself, an acceptable way to spend an afternoon.

Especially because when Grayson was trying to wheedle him into a second match, Damian was able to convince him to play for stakes.

"Fine," Grayson agreed. "If I win, you'll play whatever game I choose for the next month with no complaining."

"Fair," Damian conceded. "If I win, I get a dog."

"You get a _what?"_

"The stakes have been agreed to, Grayson. If you find them disagreeable, I suggest you win."

* * *

 **A/N:** **Next up, Tim and Jason's magical mystery tour.**


	7. Tim (Reprise)

"Are you sure this is a good idea?"

Another tumbler clicked into place as Jason carefully worked the lock from where he knelt on the floor. "We need a place to plan this thing out."

"Yes, but Dick's apartment?"

The door clicked open. Jason stood. "Look at it this way. It's the last place they'll look for us. And it's not like either of us has an apartment yet."

Jason had a point, Tim conceded privately as they slipped inside. In a few months when they were both off at college it might be different - that had yet to be entirely settled - but for now . . .

Tim perched uneasily on the edge of Dick's couch. Jason made a beeline for the kitchen and started rooting through the fridge. "So where do you want to hit first? That French place? Somewhere in Gotham to get more info on the prehistory thing? I just kind of assumed you'd want to go to France first since it was the big bone of contention, but I figure you've put more thought into it."

Tim nodded and fiddled with the jump drive in his pocket that held everything he'd managed to figure out so far. "I've found out everything I can about what happened in Gotham's earliest history. Unfortunately, there just isn't much that survived from that time, so whatever data there might have been is gone."

Jason emerged triumphant from the fridge with a box of leftover pizza. "And Bruce would have known that," he pointed out. "So he's probably not counting on us getting too much from that time period."

"Right." Tim hesitated. "If he's going forward in time like we hope, then France is the last known location, and I want to find out what's there as soon as possible. But - "

"Ra's."

"I'd rather he take as long as possible to know we're after Bruce. I don't know what he'll do about it, but I doubt we'll like it."

Jason stuffed a piece of cold pizza in his mouth. "So ideally we'd avoid him as long as possible." He swallowed. "What do you want to do?"

"England," Tim said reluctantly. "We'll start there."

"Suits me. Which just leaves one more problem. Your codename."

Tim winced.

"You could just keep using Robin," Jason pointed out. "It's not like Dick would know."

Tim shook his head. "It's his name. I want to respect that."

Jason shrugged. "Your choice. You got another one in mind?"

"Not . . . really." His mind kept getting stuck on Robin. It was Dick's name, of course it was, but he kept thinking about just how much it had meant when the name had been given to him, and the thought of it being ripped away, in addition to everything else that had happened, made him want to scream.

Jason nodded. He looked strangely nervous. "It might help if you had something similar. It'd be easier to get used to."

It was a good point. Tim still had no ideas.

"You could be, like, Red Robin or something. If you wanted." Jason's shoulders hunched a bit. "I know the name's not exactly as big a deal as Dick's, not nearly as much good history there, but - "

Jason's name. One of the one's the papers had given him during his rampage. Not a name he had been proud of, necessarily, not one he had wanted to keep, but a name he winced to have mentioned. A name it must have cost him something to offer.

Tim swallowed hard. "Yeah," he said softly. "Yeah, I'd - I'd like that."

Jason grinned at him. "Cool. So, you get us plane tickets on that phone of yours, and I'll scavenge as much as I can from here. We might have to sneak back into the Cave for some more supplies, but then we can be off."

Tim clung to that word "we."

* * *

Fact finding wise, England didn't manage to establish much, but then, Tim hadn't expected it to. You couldn't make out a pattern from the first data point on the map.

It did, however, give them a thread to start from. That, Tim felt, was what they had to focus on.

"So on the bright side, we've now got a description of the man who inspired our bat-knight," Tim said as he ran the hotel's washcloth under the sink and dabbed it carefully to his lip.

"To be fair, we've got _three_ descriptions," Jason pointed out from his spot leaning on the bathroom's doorframe.

"All of which fit Bruce." To be fair, the one that had described him as a fey creature that was half-man, half-bat wasn't _strictly_ accurate, but it was close enough. "And better, we've got a local legend saying he disappeared into thin air after being wounded. If there's some account of him showing up already wounded in France then we'll have some idea of what direction he's moving in." He gave up on his split lip and just pressed the cloth to his forehead in the dim hope that it would do something for his headache.

"Oh, give me that." Jason snatched the washcloth from him and replaced it with an icepack he must have grabbed from the mini-fridge. "All true, but more importantly, what else did we learn today?"

"That competing local legends can cause bar fights?"

"That baby birds should leave the fighting to their elders."

"You're two years older, Jason. Less. You lost half a year."

"Yeah, well, I'm not the one who almost got a concussion courtesy of an eighty year old man."

"What was I supposed to do?" Tim protested. "I couldn't hit him. Besides, what would Alfred say if he could hear you right now?"

Jason paused. "Point. Okay, you don't tell Alfred I said that, and I won't tell anyone you got hit over the head by a geriatric."

Tim grinned a little. "Bruce is going to be a terrifying eighty year old."

Jason squeezed his shoulder. "Yeah," he said like it was a promise. "He will be."

* * *

Jason's neck had been prickling ever since they stepped off the train. He was pretty sure Ra's people had been following them for at least that long.

That was the problem with medium sized towns where Ra's had a summer home. It was too easy for the old zombie to have them followed, and everyone important in the town was probably deep in his pocket. Jason just hoped that the librarian they were following around the archive didn't count as important.

The woman came to a stop outside a display case buried in the back. An old diary was propped open inside as well as a couple of official looking documents. "It's a fascinating story that you've chosen for your research project," she said enthusiastically in lightly accented English. "It's quite the local legend. Parents still tell their children that if they're bad, the bat-man will steal them away into the woods."

Tim and Jason shared significant glances.

Jason smiled at her with as much charm as he could muster. "In some of the similar stories we've tracked down, the mythical figure is held to be invulnerable. Is that the case here?"

"Almost, but not quite," she admitted. She tapped the glass right above the journal. "According to the local priest at the time, the creature resisted all attempts at injury until the priest's own staff hit his shoulder. When it touched him, he let out a cry of pain. After that they knew only holy weapons could hurt him."

Jason fought to keep a straight face. Bruce was never going to live this down with they got back. _Never._

Even aside from that attraction, a giddy hope kept wanting to steal onto his face. Bruce's shoulder had been injured in England. If the staff had elicited such a reaction here, then it must still have been hurt.

Which meant Bruce was going _forward_ in time.

"Is there any idea of how long the creature may have stayed in the area?" Tim was asking.

The librarian bit her lip. "There's no official consensus, but there are some clues," she admitted. "Mainly in Marie's later writings. Unfortunately, those aren't open to the general public. They're very fragile."

"How would we go about getting permission?" Tim asked.

The librarian launched into a spiel - something about forms and credentials and a lot more time than Jason was really comfortable spending here.

Especially since the prickle on his neck was back and stronger than ever.

A little red dot appeared on the back of the librarian's head.

Jason stepped forward into its path and turned to follow the trajectory.

The beam was coming through the small window, but one of Ra's men was standing in between the narrow shelves. He beckoned imperiously.

Jason nodded tensely and turned back to Tim with a show of checking his watch. "Oh, man, they're going to kill us," he interrupted. Casual, with just a hint of frazzled. _We're in trouble, baby bird._ "We were supposed to meet with the professor ten minutes ago."

Tim's eyes flicked toward where Jason had just been looking. "Shoot," he said, his voice just a little too calm. "I'm so sorry. We'll have to come back and fill all that out later."

"Any time," the woman assured them.

Jason slung an arm over Tim's shoulders and whispered hurriedly in his ear as he steered them toward the waiting man. "They threatened the civilian. We head with them for now, get out as soon as we can. Got it?"

Tim nodded tightly.

"Good." He squeezed Tim's shoulders and let go, striding forward to meet the waiting man. "Mindless goon thirty-two! Long time no see. How's work been?"

The man's face remained impassive. "My master wishes to see you."

Jason waved him onward. "Then by all means, lead the way."

* * *

Jason had figured that the goon was going to lead them out to some form of transportation to take them up to Ra's compound. His plan had been to make a break for it somewhere between Point A and Point B where there weren't many civilians around and then keep running until Ra's stopped following.

Sure enough, there was a car waiting outside.

Somewhat derailing his plan was the fact that Ra's wasn't waiting at the end of the ride. Ra's was sitting in the car to go _along_ with the ride.

Well, Jason had always liked improvising.

It was a fancy car, with two rows of seats in the back that faced each other, so Jason slid into the seat that would let him face Ra's. Tim followed behind. "Good to see you again. You're looking great, ancient as ever. How's the family? You finally get all that fighting sorted out?"

Ra's smiled. Jason really wished he wouldn't. "It's been handled. As for family, I was very sorry to hear about your loss."

Jason blinked at him innocently. "Loss? What loss? Unless you're talking about the motorcycle I crashed, in which case, I don't want to hear about it unless you're paying for it, because I wouldn't have crashed it if not for your ninjas."

"That's not what Dick said," Tim said mildly.

"Yeah, well, Dick doesn't know everything."

Ra's looked amused, which was at least better than the alternative. "Of course I am very sorry to hear that one of my employees inconvenienced your bike, Jason, but I believe you know that I was referring to your father figure."

"Bruce? Bruce is fine. He's on a business trip. All the Gotham tabloids say so."

"The Gotham tabloids do not have the resources I do. Your deception is pitifully thin."

Jason gritted his teeth. "Much like my patience. What do you want, Ra's?"

"I have more right to ask the same of you. That you would come to one of my cities, even after our recent . . . troubles . . . I did not discount as a possibility. But you did not come for me. You're plotting something, son of the Bat."

Tim looked mildly offended that Ra's was assuming that it was Jason who was the mastermind on this expedition. Ra's had a habit of thinking of Bruce's kids as coddled and thus useless until they hit the streets, Jason knew, and he preferred to keep it that way.

"I am plotting something," Jason agreed. "It doesn't really have anything to do with B, though. I've been planning it for a long time."

Ra's looked intrigued. "Oh?"

"Yeah. Ever since you tried to make me kill me Bruce, actually." Jason pulled his arm back for a punch.

Ra's was ready. He had to have been half expecting the move ever since Jason got in the car, and Jason's preceding statement gave him plenty of warning. The old assassin was already moving as Jason pulled his arm back.

But that was okay. Jason knew all that. The important thing was that Ra's had been expecting two things from Jason, violence and escape attempts, and while Ra's was dealing with one, he wouldn't expect the other.

Ra's saw the punch. What he didn't see was the smoke bomb Tim had pulled the pin on and then released, or the way that Jason wasn't really swinging forward for a hit, he was flinging himself towards the door that Tim had quietly unlocked.

Smoke filled the vehicle. Tim and Jason leaped out, rolled to deal with the momentum, and took off running.

* * *

They came to a stop only once they were comfortably within the trees that surrounded the town. Tim leaned panting against a tree and wondered if this was where Bruce had taken Marie.

"What do you think the odds are Ra's bugged us?" Jason asked from his spot against his own tree. Unlike Tim, he wasn't at all out of breath, and he looked vaguely smug about it.

Tim scowled at him but thought it through. "Miniscule. He never got the chance."

Jason nodded. "Agreed. Not that it matters, with the whole town in his pocket."

"So we head back," Tim proposed. "Buy the first train ticket out of here and then get on the train."

Jason was the one scowling now, probably at the idea of running, but he didn't shoot it down. "You got everything you needed, then?"

Tim shook his head. "I want to see those writings. I need to figure out if Bruce's rate through time is constant or if it's speeding up."

"So we get on board the train to fool Ra's then hop off at the earliest opportunity and sneak back," Jason concluded. "Not bad, baby bird. Then what, though? Steal the papers? Seems risky since we've already shown interest. 'Wayne Heirs in French Prison' is not a headline I'm interested in."

Tim grinned at him. "We're not going to steal them."

Jason eyed him warily. "First of all, that grin is the second creepiest I've ever seen. Second of all, you put entirely too much emphasis on the word _we're._ "

* * *

"Technically," Jason hissed from his place on the bakery roof, "we're still stealing the papers."

"Yes, but now this way, Ra's stole them first," Tim said over the comm.

This was true, Jason had to admit, and it did lower their chances of being caught by the police. And counting on Ra's to be both interested in and willing to steal the documents they'd specifically asked about had been a fairly safe bet.

That didn't change the fact that he still felt like some b-list villain about to try and steal the artifact from Indiana Jones or something.

"Okay, get ready - now! No! Wait!"

Jason jerked his hand back from the grappling hook at the last moment. It didn't take him long to see the source of Tim's warning.

Only one of Ra's men had broken into the museum. One guy, Jason had been confident he could take down.

But back-up was streaming in from somewhere to cover the guy, and this was not in the plan. Not at all.

"I missed something," Tim seethed. "I don't know what - "

"Doesn't matter," Jason interrupted. He surveyed the scene. That was a lot of assassins.

And that was potentially Bruce's life on those papers.

"I can take 'em," he decided.

"Jason, no - "

Jason, _yes._

* * *

"On the bright side, we did get the papers." Jason felt obligated to point this out.

Tim just kept staring blankly out the window of the car they'd bought.

Well, stolen. But he'd left more than enough money, so - bought without permission?

He'd stick a note on it when they had to leave it.

He kept talking stubbornly onward as he would continue to do until he got a reaction. "And in fairness to myself, I was right. I totally took those guys down. It was just their reinforcements that were a bit much." Thus his aching jaw and _possibly_ a broken rib or two and assorted other minor nastiness that could have been a lot worse.

Tim's white knuckled grip on the seat's armrest got a little tighter.

"So thanks for the assist out there, Red Robin. I appreciate it."

Even tighter. Ha. He was getting warmer.

"I am sorry you had to get pulled into the fight," he said seriously. "I don't want you out there unless you have to. B's going to have my head as it is."

"Do you think I killed him?" Tim managed to get out.

Jason's hands jerked on the wheel, and he had to quickly swerve to get back on the road. "Killed who?" He had a sinking feeling he knew who. "The guy you dropped off a roof?"

Tim flinched. "I didn't drop him," he protested. "I just - I didn't realize we were that close to the edge, and - "

"Oh, hey. Hey, baby bird, don't worry about it. The roof wasn't that high, and I saw him breathing and everything. He's alive."

"He didn't get up," Tim said. "I watched. He didn't get up."

Jason winced. "Yeah. I think he might be paralyzed, to be honest. Broke something at the very least. But he's not dead! And that's the important thing. Lazarus Pit can fix up the rest. Or the dead thing, if it had come to that which it didn't."

Tim relaxed a little. "Right."

Of course, that was assuming Ra's thought he was worth the trouble and didn't just leave him to suffer. Or kill him for failing.

Jason thought he'd keep that bit to himself.

* * *

"So. What do we have?" Jason asked when they'd gotten settled into the hotel.

Tim looked up from his translation of the papers. "He stuck around for about two weeks, which is a lot less time than he spent in England."

"Two data points isn't much to go on," Jason pointed out.

"It's not," Tim agreed. "I really wish we could have gotten more from Gotham, but it is what it is. If we can just find one more location, I think I can write an equation to predict when he'll pop up in modern times and how long he'll stay there."

A thick curl of dread twisted in Jason's stomach. "You don't think he'll just come stay here?"

Tim grimaced. "Seems a bit too convenient of Darkseid, don't you think?"

Yeah, Jason had to admit, it did.

"Another thing the equation will give me is a way to estimate how fast the energy Darkseid aimed at him is being used. That might give us an idea of when the time travel will finally come to an end. If the answer, whatever it is, isn't acceptable, then we'll need a way to ground him here."

"And a way to predict the 'where' of his appearance."

"That too," Tim agreed. "But I've already got some ideas for that."

"Cool." Jason plopped down next to him on the bed. "So where's the next stop on our world tour? And have you called your girlfriend this week?"

"Why, and yes."

Jason blinked at him. "Um. Tim? I think why I want to know where we're going is fairly self-explanatory."

Tim grinned back. "Yes, I've called Steph. And we're going to a town called Why."

Jason had to sit there and just appreciate that one for a minute. "A town called Why. It suits Bruce perfectly. I think I've heard him mumble that word even more than I've heard him shout "no." Maybe we should move there. I bet it's nicer than Gotham."

"Most places are nicer than Gotham. Unfortunately, it's also in the middle of nowhere in Arizona."

"Okaaay . . . What's Bruce doing out there?"

Tim's grin stretched wider. "How much do you know of your family history?"

"As in the Todd family history or the Wayne family history? Although I've got to tell you, the answer to both is the same."

"That's what I thought. So it would probably surprise you to know that at one time there was a Wayne who was a bank robber."

"Huh. You think B's going to foil his own family's crime? Get the bad guy before he can soil the family name?"

"Not the bad _guy,_ Jason."

"It was a girl?"

"The sheriff's wife," Tim explained.

Jason whistled. "Well, whatever else they are, the Wayne family's never been boring. So. B did what the sheriff couldn't?"

"That's what it looks like," Tim agreed. "Town records say that it was an outsider who claimed to be from Gotham that finally got her arrested." He hesitated. "It's . . . thin," he admitted. "Thinner than the others. It might not have been Bruce. But the outsider came out of nowhere and didn't stay long at all. He just pops in and out of existence."

"It's worth a shot," Jason said. "If nothing else, there's no way Ra's will expect us to end up there."

* * *

"A grave," Tim said blankly.

"Yep," the kid at the reception desk said. "Folks say Anne Wayne cursed him as she was being dragged away, and then he just - " He made a little poofing noise.

"Sounds cool," Jason said. "I don't suppose you could give us directions?"

Tim let Jason drag him out to the dusty cemetery. "I guess it was a dead end after all." He didn't realize what he said until Jason snickered. "Shut up, Jason." His voice had a bit more of a snap to it than he'd intended.

"Yeah, yeah. Come on, kid." Jason steered him over to one of the thicker headstones and plopped him down on it. "I was thinking it was time we had a talk. About your parents."

Tim jerked his arm away from Jason's hold. "So you don't believe me," he spat. "All this time, you were - what? Humoring the crazy guy?"

"I don't confront Ra's to placate crazy guys," Jason said flatly. "Calm down, kid. That's not what I meant. We've found lots of evidence, right? Just because this isn't one of his appearances doesn't mean the rest of them are suddenly faked. I just thought this might be a good opportunity to talk the rest of it out while we've got a breather."

"There's nothing to talk about. They're dead. End of story."

Jason sat down on the ground next to him. "I think you've forgotten who you're talking to, baby bird. I lost my parents too, remember. Mom . . . " His face scrunched up for a moment before he forced it smooth. "She did the best she could, and I won't hear a word against her, but she could have used some help. Willis?" He snorted. "Willis never earned the title of dad. That's Bruce's, now and forever. But I still didn't find out he was dead and feel _nothing._ " He paused. "I mean, admittedly, most of what I was feeling wasn't exactly _sorry,_ but that's not the point."

"Jason."

"That's not your opening up voice. We're talking about this, Tim, whether you like it or not."

"No, Jason, _look."_ Tim hopped to his feet and ran over to the gravestone they'd ostensibly come to look at.

It was surprisingly ornate for an anonymous headstone that held only a date. The top swooped elegantly upward.

Towards where there was a small, admittedly crude but still very clear, statue of a bat.

"What." Jason said flatly. "There's no way. No. Way."

"If he left instructions . . . " Tim's mind was whirring. "He knows."

"What?"

"He knows we're looking for him. Well, not us specifically, but he has to know that someone will have figured it out. He has to hope, anyway, so he's trying to leave clues now that he's getting closer and there's a better chance of us getting it. I bet that's why he held onto the costume for so long despite it making him stand out."

"Because he didn't want to blend in. He wanted to be recorded," Jason said slowly. "Okay. That makes sense. But. Um. The grave."

"Poof," Tim said, echoing the receptionist. "He wasn't dead. He was just gone, maybe in front of a lot of people. Maybe he just faked his death. Either way, I bet it's not a coffin that's down there."

"You think he left another clue."

Tim grinned at him. "Let's go grave robbing."

"Been there. Done that. Got the t-shirt."

"Jason. Just - no."

Jason clapped him on the back. "Don't worry. I'm sure I'll think of plenty more before tonight."

Tim groaned.

* * *

"I'm getting dead tired over here."

"Jason."

"Would it kill you to do a bit of the digging?"

"Jason, you've been digging for approximately thirty seconds."

"I already had to dig my way out of a grave. Do I really have to dig my way into one?"

"Jason, trust me. You do not want me holding a shovel right now."

Jason paused for a moment. "I'll give that statement grave consideration."

* * *

The good news, as Jason saw it, was that there had been no body, no coffin, and no booby traps. The better news was that there had been a time capsule of sorts full of notes in Bruce's distinctive handwriting that made both of them happy on principle, and Tim happy for their help in his calculations.

Plus, he'd gotten a chance to use some of the puns he'd been saving. That always made for a good night.

But - Most importantly. Bruce was alive. That kept hitting him over and over again. Bruce was _alive._

He'd believed Tim, of course he had, but there was a difference between that and in seeing the cramped, obsessively neat figures fill a page.

It might even be enough to convince the others.

So that was the good news.

The bad news was, Tim had finished his calculation.

Which ought to have been good news, but neither of them liked what it had to say.

"Five minutes," Jason said flatly. "We'll have a five minute window to ground him here."

"Give or take a couple of milliseconds."

"Great," Jason said flatly. "How're we going to do that?"

Tim leaned forward. "You know those collars the Justice League has seen used on metahumans sometimes? The ones that are ridiculously good at adapting to all kinds of different powers?"

"You think it would work to block time travel."

"Exactly. Once he's grounded, the Justice League can work out a more permanent solution, assuming the power doesn't just work itself out pounding against the collar."

"Or doesn't break the collar and sending him reeling into the future," Jason felt obligated to point out. He didn't have any better ideas, though. "Okay. Collar it is. Where do we get one?"

Tim winced. "Technically, they're in several locations. Unfortunately, we're working on a limited time schedule here. Bruce is due to show back up soon."

"So . . . "

"So we're breaking into LexCorp."

* * *

"I know B may have told you that I used to steal things, but I feel like I should remind you that I stole _tires._ Not multi-billion dollar tech."

"You're halfway through the security system," Tim pointed out through the comm in what he no doubt thought was a reasonable tone of voice. "Don't you think you should have been complaining about this earlier?"

"I wasn't complaining about this earlier because I was in shock."

"Uh-huh. I've electronically deactivated the next lock for you."

Jason pulled off a move to avoid the lasers that made him wish Dick had been there to see it and dodged through the door into research and development. "Still nothing you can do about the lasers?"

"Sorry."

"'s okay, I'll manage. Or. You know. Die horribly. Again."

"At least we won't have to buy a new tombstone this time."

Jason snickered and stopped at the case he wanted. "You'd better. I want a little bat on mine this time."

"I was thinking more a glass case above the ground in case you pulled another Snow White on us."

Jason began the careful process of using a laser cutter to slice open a hole in the case without setting off one of the sensors. "Huh. I like it. But I still want bats on it. And if I come back a second time, then I want my third headstone to say, 'Third Times the Charm.' With a question mark."

"You have put way too much thought into this, Flame- " Tim cut off. "Hold on. Yes, Batgirl?"

Jason couldn't hear that end of the conversation. Hopefully it wasn't anything too crucial. He was almost through the glass.

"Okay, I'm back." Tim's voice was much tighter than before. "The good news is, the Gotham crew believes us now. The bad news is, that's because even before our notes got to them, Ra's did a little grave robbing of his own. And apparently he dunked the corpse in a Lazarus Pit."

Jason began the careful process of extracting the collar. "And the corpse obviously wasn't B?"

"Oh, it looked like him. It just couldn't control its murderous urges. And they figured - "

"If I could do it, B could do it." Looks like the clone theory won.

His hands were shaking hard enough that he had to pause for a moment in his work.

"Where's the clone now?" Jason asked to buy himself some time.

"They lost track - Flamebird, get out of there. Get out of there now."

A roar came from somewhere in the building. The alarms started blaring.

He froze. "That wasn't me."

"That would be the clone. Ra's must have led him here. Now _get out."_

With subtlety a lost cause, Jason yanked the collar out and stripped the sensors off as quickly as he could. "Give me a route."

"I'll do my best. Ra's hackers are fighting me. As well as Luthor's."

"Well, fight harder," he hissed as he ran out of the room. "Which way?"

"Up," Tim said. "If you can get into the normal office levels, you can break a window and grapple away."

"Got it."

The tower had turned into a nightmare scape of flashing lights, blaring alarms, and shadows that looked just a little too much like the Batman.

"The cameras have been shut down entirely," Tim said with forced calm. "I'm blind."

He could hear gunshots below and more of that awful roaring. "Just a thought here, are we sure we want Luthor with B's Lazarus soaked DNA?"

The comm was silent for just long enough for Jason to change direction.

"I hate it when you're right," Tim said conversationally. "Ok. I'm five minutes out. I'll try to make it faster."

"Thanks, Red." Jason raced towards the sound of the gunshots released by the increasingly frantic security guards.

Just another fight. He could do this. He could totally do this.

* * *

The report in the computer later went something like this: Luthor's guards caused fatal injury to the clone. The clone was safely cremated. Both Flamebird and Red Robin sustained damage in the fight.

That was what Tim had typed up. And that was true. Every last bit of it, even if it was lacking his usual scrupulous detail.

When he thought about it, later, he usually thought about the look on Jason's face when Bruce's fist _\- not his, not his, but too close, far too close -_ broke Jason's nose. Or the way the blood had been gushing down from Jason's forehead. Or the screaming in his own mind when the not-Bruce had pinned him to the ground, wrapped his hands around Tim's throat, and _squeezed._

When he thought about it, he thought about the way it had felt to hit someone that looked like Bruce and to try and hurt him. He thought about Jason slamming the not-Bruce into a wall, and it twisted into dreams where Ra's plans for Jason and Bruce had worked.

Mostly, though, he thought about the way the guards's bullets had finally ripped through the body armor, and the way not-Bruce had looked lying there. Dead.

He thought about having to carry the body out, and then he just tried not to think at all.

* * *

"I've got a date, a time, and a place," Tim told Jason. His voice sounded almost normal.

He couldn't describe how much he wanted things to be back to normal.

Jason looked at the map Tim had shoved at him. "This has two places marked on it."

"Yes," Tim admitted. "The most probable locations are either the place he left from . . . or Gotham."

"And we've only got one collar."

"Right. That's actually okay though, because there's something all of the locations B's shown up in have had in common, and his notes confirm it: He always shows up somewhere with a family connection. So if all of us gather in one place . . . "

"Then we can pull him in. Do we count, or is it just the brat?"

Tim smiled ruefully. "Bruce would say we count. I've no idea what the time stream thinks."

"So better safe than sorry. So - Gotham or the site of the fight? I'm inclined to say the latter just in case something goes wrong."

"Fewer civilians to endanger," Tim agreed. "Assuming we can get the others out there."

"Shouldn't be an issue. They believe us now, right?"

"Right. No problem."

* * *

"Houston, we have a problem."

Tim gripped the steering wheel a little tighter. "Batgirl, we're twenty-four hours away from showtime. Now is not a good time for a problem."

"Trust me, I know. That doesn't change the fact that the mini-bat's been kidnapped."

"Ra's," Tim cursed.

"Well, Talia specifically, but, yeah. I don't emthink/em she'll hurt him, but . . . "

"But," Tim agreed. "I assume Nightwing's gone after him."

"Yeah. There've been some pretty nasty threats if any of us leave Gotham for the next little bit."

Tim took a deep breath. "Okay. Is it bad timing, or is Ra's trying to stop us from getting B?"

"I have no idea. What do you want to do?"

Tim threw a glance over to where Jason was sleeping in the passenger seat. "It's okay. Go get the mini-bat. I've got a plan."

* * *

Originally, there had been a small town where the Justice League had fought Darkseid. Now it was just a collection of ruined buildings.

There was a spot of scorched earth in front of what had once been a school building. That was where Bruce had been taken.

That was also where Ra's and his men were now gathered.

Jason drew in a sharp breath. "That's going to be a problem," he said, ducking back behind the building they were hiding behind. "Those guys aren't the usual mooks. They're elite. I don't think we can take them on our own."

"Could we if we had Batman with us?" They were in costume, or what passed for costume with Tim, and that meant codenames even though Ra's already knew.

"I'd at least like our odds a lot better, but it's a moot point. We won't emhave/em him with us unless we can get closer. Or do you want to try and get the collar on him in the middle of a fight?"

Tim grimaced. "I don't want to, but we might have to." He scanned what remained of the town around them. "Okay. See the clock tower that's still standing?"

"Yep. Diversion?"

Tim nodded. "You go earn that name of yours. I'll stay here and keep an eye on Ra's."

"Sounds good. Stay safe, baby bird." Jason jogged off in the direction of the clock tower.

Tim waited until he was out of sight before carefully removing the comm from his ear. He didn't smash it. Jason would hear that and run back. He just set it on a piece of rubble.

And started sneaking closer to Ra's.

* * *

"I am beginning to think you're a fitting heir to your mentor as a detective, Timothy. As a fighter, however, you still lack his skill."

Considering his face was currently being ground to the dirt by one of Ra's elite, Tim didn't feel like he was in a position to argue.

Ra's paced closer. "You've been busy these last weeks. Hacking into my networks, traveling the globe . . . chasing rumors of a bat. And after the discovery of the clone, I believe I see why. So where is that you believe your mentor is, and how were you planning to retrieve him?"

"Figure it out," Tim spat.

"Mm. Left, I think."

"Wha- " The word turned into a cry of pain as a spike bar of metal crashed into his leg. Something cracked.

"Again."

The bone snapped entirely. Tim didn't bother to hold the scream in.

"I am sorry, Timothy, but it would be terribly inconvenient if you were to run away while we were having our little chat. Now. What do you know?"

Tim struggled to control his breathing. "What - What do you care?"

"Lift him up."

Tim let out another cry as he was hoisted to his feet. His leg screamed at the motion.

Ra's looked him over critically. He traced the line of Tim's jaw with his finger. Tim tried to jerk back, but the arms holding him up tightened around his ribs like a vise.

"You could almost pass for his son," Ra's murmured. He straightened back up. "I care because I have tired of this war with your mentor. It is time for him to come back to the fold and claim the place he was always meant to have."

"And you figured out we'd be here, how?"

"This is turning into a long chat instead of a short one. I begin to fear you still have some hope of stalling long enough to run away. The right now, I think."

"No - " The arms around his ribs disappeared. Tim hit the ground hard, and white hot flare of pain jolted up his leg.

Then the bar crashed down on his other one.

"Bruce!" he half-screamed, half-sobbed.

 _Come on, Dad. Come on._

* * *

The tower went up very satisfyingly. Jason started jogging back. It was getting close to the time Bruce would show up. "Red Robin, how're we doing?"

Nothing.

"Red Robin?"

He had to duck into a side street to avoid Ra's men as they ran past.

"Red Robin."

He caught the tail end of a scream.

He started to run.

Almost there, almost time . . .

 _Come on, Dad. Come on._

* * *

Bruce knew he wouldn't have long. Either someone would have figured it out and would be there waiting for him, or - Or they wouldn't have. If that was the case, then he wasn't going to have many options. He didn't have much time in any period now. If his calculations were right, he'd only have five minutes here.

The timestream felt different this time though. For the first time, it paused for a moment, and he felt tugged in two different directions.

Then one won out, and he was spat out onto a square of scorched earth. He rolled to his feet.

Ra's elite surrounded him. Ra's himself was just ahead.

And there, on the ground, was one of his sons, legs twisted in an unnatural position, chest heaving in broken sobs. There was a sword sticking out of one of his legs, and Ra's was casually twisting it.

Bruce _roared._

* * *

Jason knew that voice.

He all but flew towards it, hands fumbling for the collar in his belt.

Ra's men were a whirling mass around a dark shadow that had to be Bruce, but Bruce was ripping through them. Jason dove into it, dodging limbs and swords, occasionally getting in a hit, but mostly just going _through._

And there was Bruce, for the first time in weeks, but there was no time to celebrate. How long had been here already?

Too long.

Something was creeping up on Bruce's edges. Blurring his outline.

"No!" Jason flung himself forward onto Bruce's back. He slung the collar around Bruce's neck and snapped it shut. "Leave that, you need it!" he shouted to Bruce, and then one of Ra's was on him and there was no more time to talk.

* * *

Tim watched the fight as best he could. There wasn't much he could do from his position.

He knew Bruce had gotten broken bones before, had _fought_ with them before, but he hadn't built up the pain tolerance Bruce had. It was taking everything he had not to pass out.

Gradually, the sounds of the fight quieted, and the whirling motion settled into something that didn't make Tim's nausea worse.

"Dad," he heard Jason croak out.

"It's all right, Jay. It's all right. I'm not going anywhere." The voices got closer, and then Bruce was kneeling next to him with an arm still tight around Jason's shoulder. "Tim. Are you - "

"I'm fine," he said. It didn't even entirely sound like a lie. "The plan worked." He was still kind of amazed by that. "It worked, Bruce. You're back."

Bruce's free hand swept back his sweat soaked hair from his face. "I'm back," he promised. "I'm going to pick you up, okay, Tim? I know it's going to hurt but we need to get you out of here."

Tim nodded and tried not to make any noise when Bruce finally let go of Jason and ever so gently picked Tim up.

Jason wasn't quite ready to let that go. "The plan," he said slowly. "No, Timmy, the plan did not work. Unless, of course, you had a different plan? Maybe one you chose not to share?"

Tim buried his head in Bruce's chest and didn't answer. Bruce was back. That was all that mattered.

"Bruce was getting called through time towards family," Jason said in a quiet voice that made Tim shrink back a little bit. "Only it wasn't just family, was it, Tim? It was family in _trouble_. So since we had the only means to ground Bruce, you had to make sure we were the ones who needed him most. What were you going to do if Ra's hadn't been here, huh?"

"Where is Ra's?" Tim asked desperately.

"He must have gotten away," Bruce said. "I'll deal with him later." The last words were almost a growl. "Tim, please tell me you didn't get yourself caught on purpose."

Tim closed his eyes and refused to talk about it. "You're back," he mumbled. "Doesn't matter."

"Yes," Bruce growled, "it does," but he pressed a kiss to Tim's forehead, so Tim figured it'd be okay.

* * *

"Good news. We got Robin back. Any word on . . . ?"

"I thought I had Robin in the backseat of this car."

"Bruce!" Dick's voice cracked in the middle of the name. "You're back. They were right. They were actually right, you're alive."

"Names," Bruce said from long habit, but he softened instantly. "We'll be in Gotham in thirty minutes. I'm back."

* * *

Alfred had seen much in his many years of service to the Wayne family.

Watching on the looks on his charges faces as they crashed into Master Bruce was, perhaps, his favorite memory, and if he was a little misty eyed himself, well.

He cleared his throat. "Welcome home, Master Bruce."

Master Bruce rested a hand on his shoulder. "Thank you, Alfred." Then Alfred found himself a victim of the same crushing hug the children had received.

Well. Perhaps it was called for. Just this once.

* * *

They'd been taking turns to sit by Tim's bedside. He was in no danger, but the pain medication meant he slept a lot, and they were all in the mood to stay close.

Which was how Dick found himself giving a report on everything that had happened in Bruce's absence on the edge of Tim's bed while the man himself sat in an armchair beside it.

" . . . So that's what happened." Dick rubbed his arm. "I'm sorry," he blurted out. "I'm sorry I didn't believe Tim, I'm sorry I didn't look for you, I'm sorry I didn't handle Gotham better - "

"Dick."

Dick stopped.

"Dick, it's okay. I looked through some of your files. You did well."

"But I didn't look for you," he whispered.

"I didn't need you to look for me," Bruce countered. "Tim and Jason had that handled. I needed you to look after Damian and to look after Gotham, and you did both very, very well. I'm proud of you, Dick."

Dick let out a long, shaking breath. "Thanks. I - I needed that."

Bruce sighed. "Come here."

Dick slid off the bed and onto the floor by Bruce, leaning into his legs. Bruce wrapped an arm tightly around him.

It was going to be okay.

* * *

When Bruce finally made it down to the Cave again, it was to find Jason and Stephanie conspiring over costume designs under the amused supervision of Barbara.

"Hey, B," Jason said. "Come take a look at this."

Bruce went over and peered down at the drawings. They were rough sketches of a costume in shimmering shades of blue edged in black. A sharp beaklike mask was detailed on another sheet. 'Bluejay' was penciled in on the edges. "Considering a name change?"

Jason tried to wave it off. "Well, my old costume got pretty much trashed on the globetrotting tour."

"I still want a full debrief on that before you and Tim get a chance to conspire to hide things about that."

"Oh, you are way too late for that, old man. Anyway. Since I was at the least going to have to get that one fixed up, I got to thinking, and . . . Flamebird was about coming back."

"And burning stuff down," Bruce reminded him wryly.

"Right. But I faced Ra's down, and the Pit was gone. I didn't hear a thing. I don't want . . . I don't want my whole life to be about the fact I came back, you know? I thought maybe it was time to go back to being Jay." He looked up at Bruce a little uncertainly.

"Your name," Bruce told him. "Your choice. But I like it." He turned to Stephanie. "You, on the other hand, we still need to talk about."

"I'm eighteen in three months," she pointed out instantly.

"Yes. In three months."

"I've already been out on the streets. Come on, B. How much of a difference is three months really going to make?"

"If you want to keep going out there, I won't stop you."

She eyed him suspiciously. "Really?"

"Hey!" Jason protested. "You made me stop when I got started too young!"

Bruce barreled on. "If."

"Oh, boy," Stephanie said.

 _"If_ you finally tell your mother about all of this first."

Stephanie stared at him in horror. "Bruce, if I do that, I won't be going out when I'm eighteen. I won't be going anywhere until I'm _thirty."_

"She needs to know."

Stephanie let her face fall into her hands. "Fine," she moaned. "Fine. Just don't blame me when all of Arkham breaks loose, and you desperately need me, and I have to be all, "Sorry, I'm still grounded for the next _ten centuries.""_

"I won't," Bruce said solemnly. He turned to Barbara.

"If this is the part where you judge me for letting her go out there, I don't want to hear it."

"No." He didn't . . . like it, but he understood it, and he couldn't come up with something they should have done instead. "How's the physical therapy going?"

Barbara deflated a little. "Oh. Good. I'm on track."

"Good." He nodded to Stephanie. "So if she's Batgirl, who will you be?"

"Bruce, I will be nearly twenty-nine when I hit those streets again. I have earned Bat _woman._ "

Bruce's lips twitched. "Fair enough."

* * *

After the initial greeting, Damian had been lurking around the edges. Bruce was somewhat relieved when Damian finally marched forward and presented himself in Bruce's office.

Bruce set aside the papers he'd been looking at. "Damian." He wasn't sure quite what to say. His absence had disrupted the fragile connection he'd started to make. Then his eyes caught the movement behind Damian. "Is that a dog?"

Damian moved aside a little. "That is Titus, yes. Grayson allowed his purchase three weeks ago." Uncertainty flickered across his face. "You will not dispose of him, will you?"

Bruce really didn't like the implications of 'dispose of.' "No, of course not."

Damian's shoulders lowered a bit. "Good. Grayson also owes me a cow."

"A what," Bruce said flatly.

"A cow. He had a run of bad luck with Candyland."

"Candyland."

"Yes."

Well, at least his life hadn't gotten any saner in his absence. "Remind me to talk to Dick about letting pets be stakes in board games."

"As you wish, Father."

Bruce sighed and got up around the desk to kneel in front of Damian. "Son. How are you?"

Damian's eyes flicked down. "I am fine."

"Dick told me what happened," he said gently. "I'm sorry that's how you had to see your mother again."

"I am fine," he repeated, but his voice was a lot smaller.

"You will be," Bruce corrected before drawing him into a hug.

Damian was stiff within it for a moment before giving in and returning it. "I am glad you are home, Father. I am - sorry that I was not of assistance in retrieving you."

"You and your brothers are all safe. I'm home. Barbara and Stephanie are safe. That's all I care about."

* * *

"Hey, Bruce."

Bruce looked up from his papers. "Tim! You're awake."

"Think so," Tim agreed. "And you're here." He reached out a hand for confirmation.

Bruce squeezed it. "I'm here," he agreed. "And we need to talk."

Tim winced. "About Ra's?"

"That too."

Tim's winced deepened. "About Red Robin?"

"And that."

"Then what - oh." Tim's eyes dropped. "You found out about my parents."

"I did. I'm so sorry, Tim."

Tim's lips trembled. "I'm - You know, I didn't think - They didn't care. Why should I have to care?"

"Oh, Tim." Bruce moved over to the bed. Tim buried his face in Bruce's side. Bruce ran his fingers through Tim's hair. He didn't know what to say to that. He'd never had that problem.

But just sitting there seemed to be enough. Tim stayed curled into him until he'd cried himself out. "Sorry," he muttered as he sat up, looking almost embarrassed. "I couldn't - everyone thought that was why I was so sure you were alive. So I had to prove them wrong."

 _So you couldn't cry._

Bruce sighed. "Which brings us to the other point. Tim, I'm grateful that you and Jason worked so hard to save me. Very grateful. But it's not actually your job to keep jumping in front of bullets for me, metaphorical or otherwise."

Tim frowned at him. "Technically, it's not your job to jump in front of anything for us either."

"I'm your _father."_ He froze as soon as the words were out of his mouth. Not because the words weren't true, but because right after discussing the death of Tim's actual father probably wasn't the time to say it.

But Tim looked . . . happy? "Thanks," he said quietly. "Ra's kept talking about how I was almost good enough to be mistaken for yours, and - thanks."

"Tim, you're brilliant," Bruce said. "And brave enough to give me a heart attack. Just - be careful, all right? By the time you're healed up and back in condition, you'll be old enough to be out in a cape, and there's only so much strain my heart can take."

Tim looked down at his lap and started picking at the blanket. "About . . . that. I've been thinking. Barbara's going to be Batwoman soon."

"Yes," Bruce agreed, wondering where this was going.

"I was thinking maybe I could be Oracle. Just for a while. Before I went out on the streets. If that's okay, I mean."

Bruce stared at him.

Tim started backtracking quickly. "You know what, never mind, I'm sure Damian will be trained enough by then to - "

Bruce hugged him. Possibly too tightly. But under the circumstances, he thought he could be forgiven.

"I think you broke him," Dick said from the doorway. "Also, congratulations on your new position as favorite child."

Bruce made a small, protesting noise, but he didn't let go.

Tim patted his back awkwardly. "So, you don't . . . mind? Think less of me?"

"Tim. _Tim._ I have been campaigning for all of you to stay in the Cave since Dick first convinced me to let him go down there. _No,_ I don't mind that one of my children finally has a shred of sense. I'm delighted."

"Plus, we really will need a new Oracle," Dick said brightly. "And you'll be brilliant at it."

Bruce finally let go. "As happy as I am," he said, "I do have to ask. Is this about what happened on your trip to find me?"

Tim looked away. "I - hurt a guy. Pretty bad. And we had to fight your clone, and I just - I just need a bit more time. And I've always liked the background stuff, the hacking and the detective work, more anyway."

"Okay. Then you can stay Oracle as long as you want, assuming Barbara's okay with handing down the title. And we'll talk about the rest of it when you've had a bit of a break, alright?"

"Okay," Tim said quietly. "I'm - really glad you're home."

"Me too, Tim. Me too."

* * *

Dick hung around even after Bruce left to go deal with a suspicious crashing sound.

"Dick?" Tim asked curiously.

Dick smiled at him weakly. "Hey, little brother." He dropped onto Bruce's spot on the bed with a sigh. "I figured I owed you an apology."

Tim frowned. "For thinking I was crazy? Or for Robin?"

"I - for all of it. You were right, Tim. And you've got the perfect right to say I told you so - goodness knows Jason already has - "

"About a million times."

" - and you're owed a few of those too. And I am - I'm not sorry I did everything I could to stop you from running off to get yourself killed because clearly," Dick said poking lightly at one of Tim's casts, "I was right to worry. Although apparently Jason wasn't the reckless one after all."

"He couldn't be," Tim said, a bit of exhaustion creeping into his voice. "He was trying to look after me."

"Yeah, that sounds like him." Dick looked down. "And I should have been there to look after you too. I'm not sorry I tried to protect you, but I went about it the wrong way. I gave you Robin because you needed it. I shouldn't have taken it away because I was scared."

Tim considered this for a long moment. "I forgive you. Sorry I scared you."

Dick laughed. "At this point, I think that's just what this family does."


	8. Cass

They'd all been captured by villains before. Technically, there was nothing to be ashamed of, especially not when he'd been taken down by one who'd been playing catch and release with heroes all across America.

There was just something about being caught off guard, knocked out, and cocooned in duct tape from some guy calling himself the Magpie of all things that rubbed Dick's pride wrong.

Especially since the guy had removed his utility belt and was now poking through it, throwing items over his shoulder as he discarded them.

"I've turned up the sensitivity on your comm," Tim said in his ear. "We can hear everything the Magpie's saying. If it looks like things are escalating, we'll know."

"Tt," Damian said. The sound was scornful, but Dick thought he sounded a bit uneasy. "Nightwing will be fine. None of the other heroes were harmed by this pitiful collector."

That was true, but based on the grim comments Jason and Bruce had made earlier, that still wasn't reassuring them much.

For that matter, it wasn't reassuring Dick. He was getting a little worried about what exactly Magpie would find.

"ETA five minutes," Barbara said. "Batgirl and I can take him down easily enough. Just hang in there, Nightwing."

He wished he could tell them to hurry it up, but he didn't quite dare to risk Magpie knowing he still had his comm.

Although at the moment, he doubted Magpie would notice. He was still muttering to himself as he sorted through the belt. "Antidote, antidote, bandages, batarang . . . another batarang . . . "

"Hey, batarangs make great souvenirs," Dick tried. "It'll really go with everything else you've collected."

Magpie scoffed. "Everyone's got batarangs. I want something _special."_

"I don't really carry priceless heirlooms around with me."

"Nightwing, don't antagonize him," Bruce growled.

Dick couldn't help it. He _really_ didn't want Magpie poking around in there. Besides, Magpie didn't look antagonized. He'd just gone back to ignoring his prisoner.

"Grappling hook, evidence . . . evidence . . . Oh!"

And that's what he'd been trying to avoid.

"A ring. A _diamond_ ring." Magpie fingered it greedily.

"Say what now?" Jason said in his ear.

Dick swallowed. "That's evidence."

"No, no." Magpie shook his head. "The evidence was bagged. This is something else." He looked up. "Who was it for?" he asked eagerly.

Dick nodded to a spot just behind him. "Her."

Barbara sprang out of the shadows under the window she'd snuck into. Behind him, Dick could feel a tugging motion as Stephanie started to cut through the duct tape.

"Magpie's out," Barbara announced. There was dead silence on the comms. She leaned down and picked up the ring. "This is a terrible proposal."

Dick winced. "I had something a lot better planned, I swear." It would be hard to get much worse than this - him still half-swaddled in duct tape, the ring only just rescued from a villain, everyone listening in on comms.

"It's interesting at least," Barbara conceded. She grinned at him from under the mask. "A good story to tell the kids."

"So that's a yes?" he asked hopefully.

"That's a yes."

Cheering erupted from Stephanie, Jason, and Tim.

And - he wasn't sure about this one, but - he was pretty sure he heard Bruce mutter, "Finally."

* * *

Bruce let himself linger in the Cave's showers for a few extra minutes. He just - needed a minute. As glad as he was that Dick and Barbara were now engaged, it wasn't quite enough to wipe out the bone jolting terror that had shot through him when he first heard Nightwing's been taken over the comms.

But Dick was fine, he reminded himself, just as Jason was now fine, and they were both upstairs with everyone else, celebrating.

Or, he corrected himself as he finally emerged from the showers, upstairs with almost everyone else. Tim, apparently, was still down in the Cave, and based on his location just outside the bathroom door, he'd been waiting for Bruce.

"It won't take long," Tim promised before Bruce had a chance to say anything. "There's just something I think you should see."

Bruce frowned. "What?"

Tim led him over to the computers. "I thought I saw something on the cameras tonight. Once the Magpie showed up, I put it down to him, but even after we caught him, there was this flicker that kept showing up, so I slowed it down and messed with the resolution and reflections, and . . . " His fingers flew over the keyboard as he talked until three pictures appeared on the screen, none of them particularly clear.

"There's more," Tim said, "but these are the best."

All of them were of a girl. She looked half-starved and feral, dressed in ragged clothes, and clinging to the shadows. All of the shots are from increasingly improbable positions: a roof, a gargoyle, a window ledge he thought even Dick might hesitate before trying to get to. And the locations . . .

"She was following Dick."

"I think so," he agreed. "She wasn't there when he was taken though. She was back here." He pulled up a video that started with a group of thugs Dick had tied up earlier in the evening. Tim clicked play.

The grainy footage showed a few other members of the gang stumbling across the scene before the police could arrive. They reeled back in shock for a moment before hurrying forward to cut their friends loose.

The girl dropped down from the shadows above them and began to fight.

The clip ended ten seconds later. The fight was already done.

"She tied them up too," Tim reported. "Best I can tell, she waited with them until the police came."

Bruce took a deep breath. "We've got another vigilante. Any idea how old she is?"

Tim grimaced. "I ran the software, but with how malnourished she is . . . It's hard to say. There's no record of her in the database. Probably not over eighteen, though. If I had to guess."

"And where is she now?"

" . . . I lost her," Tim admitted. "She's got a good instinct for the cameras. She's managed to dodge them for a couple of hours now. I've put her on our alert system. If she comes back in view, we'll know." Tim looked up at him expectantly for further instructions.

His first instinct was to head back into the night to look for her.

But he had no idea where she might be, and the others were still waiting upstairs.

He sighed. "There's nothing else we can do tonight. Tomorrow, finding her becomes our first priority."

"Got it." Tim swiveled his chair away from the computer and turned to grin up at him. "In the meantime, should I tell Alfred to start setting up a room?"

"You know, I don't adopt _every_ child vigilante I come across."

"You just keep telling yourself that, Bruce."

* * *

"B, check your ten o'clock," Tim ordered tensely on the comms.

Bruce turned instantly.

 _There._ The girl, half-hidden behind a wall on the next roof over. She met his eyes warily.

He raised his arms as non-threateningly as he could. "Hello." He took a slow step forward.

"B, I'm two roofs behind her," Jason reported. "Want me to cut her off?"

"Carefully," he said quietly. He took another step forward.

The girl bolted. Bruce took off after her.

But no matter how they looked, the girl was gone.

* * *

There was at least some good news. By the next night, there had been a breakthrough.

"So I pulled Barbara in to help Damian and I, and we finally made a breakthrough this afternoon," Tim reported as Bruce descended into the Cave. "We know who our mystery girl is."

Barbara, already in costume, looked up from her own place by the computers. "Cassandra Cain. Daughter of David Cain and Lady Shiva."

One of those names sounded familiar. And not in a good way.

"We weren't able to dig up much more than that online," Tim continued.

"Fortunately," Damian interrupted, "I was able to shed some more light on the matter."

Bruce had a League shaped headache forming. "Ra's is involved somehow, isn't he," he said flatly.

"Cain hoped to provide Grandfather with a superior bodyguard," Damian admitted. "One with exceptional abilities at reading body language. Unfortunately, the project failed when I was young, and I was not told much in any case once it was decided that the methods being used to train the candidate were unsuitable for my own training."

Bruce was familiar with some of the more horrifying aspects of Damian's training.

If whatever Cassandra had been through was worse, then it wasn't surprising she was so ready to run.

* * *

The next time, Bruce caught her reflection before anyone caught her on the cameras.

That time, Bruce was prepared.

He didn't turn around that time. Instead, he reached into his utility belt and pulled out a sealed thermal bag. He opened it before removing one of Alfred's cookies, still warm. He broke off a piece and took a bite.

Hopefully, his body language would make them look appealing. And the bite might assure her they weren't poisoned.

Then he laid the rest of the cookies out on the bag and sat down a few paces away.

He didn't hear her move behind him. She just appeared suddenly in his peripheral vision as she cautiously reached for one of the cookies.

He waited for her to take it before he spoke. "You're welcome to all of them," he said quietly. Gently.

Cassandra tilted her head curiously, but she didn't move to take another cookie.

Painfully slowly, he reached out and pushed the bag closer to her. Her face brightened, and she took another cookie and crammed it in her mouth.

"Do you understand English?" he asked. She just kept munching on the cookies. "Español? No?" Arabic, maybe, if she'd been meant for Ra's? "عربى?"

She just kept eating and watching him patiently.

He ran through the rest of the languages he knew. When he ran out, the others started throwing in whatever they knew over the comms, and a couple of things he was pretty sure Stephanie had used her phone to pull off Google Translate.

Cassandra eventually got bored and stood up.

"Wait," he said, scrambling to his feet. He held a hand out to her. "Come with me. Please." Maybe she could at least understand the intent behind the words.

She hesitated, but then she shook her head and ran.

"Should we pursue?" Jason asked over the comms.

As much as it burned him - "Let her go. We'll have to do this slowly."

* * *

 _Slowly_ turned into two weeks of her following all of them, of them carefully offering food that was only sometimes accepted, and of her never getting quite close enough to touch.

But she was still there. Bruce held on to that, at least.

* * *

Damian had been eyeing Bruce critically all through breakfast. Jason hoped this was because Bruce looked dead tired and not because Damian was campaigning for some new animal that had been denied.

"This has gone on long enough," Damian finally announced with a huff. Father, you are exhausting yourself. Surely there is a quicker way to get Todd a paramour."

Jason spewed orange juice across the table. It landed on Tim. Since Tim reacted to neither the juice nor the comment, Jason was going to assume he hadn't managed to procure any coffee this morning and was thus brain dead.

Judging by the way Bruce was coughing, he'd choked on his coffee. _"What?"_ he managed to wheeze out.

"Yes," Jason said flatly. "Seriously. _What."_

Damian waved a hand impatiently. "I am not blind. I have seen the way you have been trying to lure this Cain in."

Bruce slowly lowered the coffee. "I have been trying to convince Cassandra to trust us and perhaps to come home with us so we can make sure she's alright, yes. I'm . . . afraid I don't quite follow your reasoning beyond that."

"Tt. I am not a _child,_ Father. I know how this works. I have read the files."

Jason's outrage had faded into gleeful fascination. He could not _believe_ Tim was blindly eating through this.

"The - files," Bruce said.

"Yes. Gordon took to the streets as a vigilante, you brought her in, and Grayson subsequently began courting her. Brown did the same, you brought her in, and Drake began courting her in turn. The pattern is clear. Technically Todd should have come first," Damian conceded, "but as he was not with us at the time, it was not possible. You now seek to rectify this."

Bruce looked to be resisting the urge to facepalm. Jason was just outright cackling.

Damian looked between them. "I see I have made some mistake," he said stiffly.

"Is that how things are done in the League?" Bruce asked.

Damian tilted his head. "I do not know," he admitted. "I was too young to take an interest in such matters when I left. But based on the pattern here, I assumed . . . "

"Oh, come on," Jason wheezed in between laughs. "I know for a fact Dick's made you watch something sappy with a romance in it. Surely you realized your little theory isn't the normal way of doing thing."

"He did. However, nothing else our family does is normal. I saw no reason this had to be the exception."

Okay, point.

Bruce took back control of the conversation. "I am not trying to secure a . . . paramour . . . "

Jason started cackling again.

" . . . for Jason. I am merely trying to make sure she's safe. If she needs a home, I thought perhaps we could provide one."

Damian's eyes widened. "You want to _adopt_ her."

"I had considered it," Bruce admitted. "But that won't matter until we can convince her to trust us." He swallowed, looking highly uncomfortable. "That said, in the meantime, perhaps we should discuss some other . . . things. To prevent such misunderstandings from happening again."

"First thing to know," Jason said, "is girlfriend. The word you were looking for earlier is girlfriend. No one says paramour anymore. Second thing is, I am so out of here. Have fun, Bruce." He pushed himself back from the table and hurried out the door.

Tim still seemingly had no idea what was going on. Jason wasn't sure if he was concerned or impressed, but he _was_ sure that there was no way he was sticking around for that. If Tim woke up in the middle of the conversation, he was on his own.

* * *

"You replacing me, Boss-man?"

Bruce looked up from his paperwork at his office in Wayne Enterprises and frowned. "Shouldn't you be in class?"

Stephanie waved a hand. "Afternoon class is canceled for the day. Again. I swear that professor cancels more often than he doesn't. _Anyway,_ that's not the point."

"Which professor?" he asked. Maybe it was time he had a talk with a few contacts over at Gotham University. There was a reason he hadn't wanted the children to go there. It wasn't exactly Ivy League, but surely it could at least do better than this.

em"Bruce./em So not the point. Focus here." She slapped a tabloid down onto the desk.

NEW BATGIRL? the headline screamed. A blurry photo of a girl with spiky black hair, a ragged black cape, and an awkward bat pinned to her ragged shirt was splashed across the cover. The picture showed her perched on the railing of a fire escape as she looked down at the brutally taken down criminals below.

Bruce stared at it for one long, disbelieving moment. _"Why."_

"I know!" Stephanie threw her hands up in the air. "Why would they assume she was replacing me? Couldn't they just come up with a new name? I mean, come on, how much creativity does it take?"

"Stephanie. We're in public."

"Fine. I am offended on behalf of Batgirl, _whoever she may be_ , that some journalist saw a girl wearing a bat symbol and assumed replacement."

Bruce couldn't stop staring at the picture. "How many of the tabloids was this in?"

"Like, all of them. Including the ones you own."

He groaned. "So now she'll be a bigger target."

" . . . I hadn't thought of that. Do you think Ra's will come after her?"

"Why not," Bruce growled. "He's come after almost all my other children."

"Public, Bruce," she said in a sing-song voice. Then: "Wait. Your other children? Oh, man, you've got the adoption papers drawn up already, don't you?"

 _"Stephanie."_

* * *

Ra's did send someone after Cassandra. Bruce knew this for a fact because he dropped down in the middle of one of their fights.

Cassandra fought like no one he'd ever seen before. Blurry video footage could never capture the speed, the grace, the sheer art of the way she moved.

She probably could have taken all the men on her own. Bruce helped anyway.

When the fight was over, Bruce knelt down next to one of the men with a wounded arm and tapped the wound before pointing to Cassandra in question.

She shook her head before pointing right back at Bruce.

The old wound in his shoulder had probably been aggravated again, but he wasn't bleeding. Much. He shook his head.

She frowned and sidled closer, putting a hand on his weak shoulder.

He was careful to stay very, very still.

She tapped it, very gently, before pointing back to the man's wounded arm. Her frown was sterner than before.

"I'll get it seen to," he promised quietly, nodding with a sigh. He had no idea how to mime that. Hopefully, she understood.

She seemed too, because she nodded and smiled.

He was pretty sure he had a shadow for the rest of the night.

* * *

The next time Bruce saw Cassandra, he had a new strategy ready.

She didn't understand words, so maybe she would understand pictures.

He'd convinced Damian, the best artist among them, to draw a few simple images.

Cassandra curled up with a plate of the cookies she favored. Cassandra safely asleep in a bed. Cassandra in fresh clean clothes.

All of them preceded by a drawing of Bruce holding out his hand to her.

He camped out on a rooftop and laid the pictures out around a plate of sandwiches. He propped up a flashlight to make sure the images were visible.

Then he sat down to wait.

* * *

The worried-man-with-food was waiting for her. He did that sometimes. She wasn't sure why he did that, but she liked it. When he waited for her, he normally had even better food than normal.

And it was nice. To be wanted. Nice that he was worried _for_ her, and not of what she might do.

He didn't know what she had done, once. What she was so very careful not to do again.

She liked the others, too - the laughing-man-who-danced-in-air, the sharp-eyed-woman-who-saw-much, the fierce-wary-man-who-fought-with-heart, and the bubbling-happy-purple-girl. But they talked often. The worried-man-with-food talked some, but not too much. She liked that.

So she slid out of her hiding place and went to see what he had for her this time. Bread-meat-lettuce. No cookies. She frowned. She had wanted cookies, but the bread-meat-lettuce things would have to do.

As she ate, she looked down at the pictures.

They were of her.

She reached out to touch one.

That was her.

Except - she hadn't slept like that since she got to this city. To sleep like that, she had to break into a living-place, and she hadn't wanted to do that here. She had worried that would anger the bat-people, and she had wanted to follow them. To learn better how to fight without doing - without doing the bad thing.

She looked at the other pictures. They were . . . She wanted them.

But she would have to follow the worried-man-with-food to his living-place.

She looked up. He was watching her. He was - very worried. Longing. Cautious. Protective.

She frowned. What was there to be protective of? None of his smaller bats were lurking nearby.

She made his worried face at him - all exaggerated, with screeched up eyebrows and pursed lips - and then pointed to him, shrugging her shoulders to ask why.

He pointed back to her.

Her. He was protective of - her?

She could fight. He knew that. He had seen her fight.

She pointed to herself to check.

He nodded.

Oh.

She looked down at the pictures again. She started gathering them up, looking up to make sure it was okay.

The worried-man-with-food nodded.

Good. They were hers.

But. Should she go with him?

She didn't know.

She tapped her head. She needed to think.

The worried-man-with-food's shoulders hunched, but he nodded.

She would think on this, then.

* * *

Only she didn't have time to think as she wished. A woman-with-magic came and brought with her soldiers that were dead-but-still-moved. She had to fight.

They were winning the fight. The bat-people were winning.

But. But the woman-with-magic hit her with the light-that-changed, and then -

She could not see how the woman would move next. She always saw how people would move next, but she didn't know now.

And her thoughts were strange.

The bubbling-happy-purple-girl flipped over a dead-but-still-moving solider. "Cassandra? You okay?"

Okay. Okay. Okay.

The word echoed in her head, and it meant -

It meant no blood on the arm. It meant no aching shoulder. It meant -

It meant.

Cassandra.

Her.

She could not see how others would move, and she did not know what it meant when they did, and there were words, words, words, and they meant something now, but not enough. They did not mean enough.

Cassandra ran.

* * *

She was halfway around the world before he managed to catch up with her.

Bruce eased himself down next to her on the roof she'd curled up on, hugging her knee.

"Can't fight right," she told him haltingly.

"I know." He'd seen the footage. He saw her injuries now.

"Shiva. Teach me to fight right."

He tensed. If that was anything like her earlier training . . . "How long would that take?"

"A night," she said. "Promised. Just one night."

"But?"

Cassandra hunched in on herself more. "Wants something."

"What does she want?" Maybe he could get whatever it was. Then Cassandra could come home happy, and all this could be over.

"A year. I will - a year to use. To fight. Then - we fight. One dies."

"No," he said instantly, even though it wasn't his choice.

Cassandra looked up at him. She was rocking herself back and forth. "Won't kill," she promised. "Know kill is bad, now. Kill, can't come back. Die instead."

 _"No."_ The old terror gripped him. She wasn't even his, not yet, but he couldn't let another child die. He couldn't. "No."

She frowned at him. "Can't fight," she reminded him.

"I can teach you," he said desperately.

"Teach . . . like her?"

"No," he admitted, "not in a night, maybe never like you were, but - you've seen me fight. I can teach you."

She stuck her lip out thoughtfully. "Dangerous. Weak, while I train. Can't help."

"We'll do the fighting while you train." That would get her off the streets for a while, at least.

"But I could be perfect. For a year, perfect."

"Or you could stay," he countered. "You could stay and train with us and have the rest of your life. Have a - Have a family."

"Family." She tasted the word. "Family like - Cain?" She was frowning now.

"No," he said firmly. "Family like this." He pulled out one last drawing Damian had done.

It was of the whole family on one of Dick's game nights. Dick and Barbara were leaning on each other and laughing, Tim and Steph were holding hands under the table, Alfred was smiling as he laid another tray of drinks down, and Damian was perched on the back of Bruce's chair so that he could see over his shoulder. Jason was crowing triumphantly at his victory.

"Family," she repeated, touching the picture. She bit her lip. "Family . . . different kind of perfect?"

He huffed a small laugh. "A different kind of perfect," he agreed. As crazily imperfect as they could be.

She held the picture carefully. "Want that," she said softly.

He let out a long breath. "Good."

She looked up and tapped him hard in the chest. "Must train," she reminded him.

"I will," he promised her.

"Want own name when ready to fight."

"Fair enough." He had done it. He had done it, he had done it.

She scooted closer until she was leaning into his side. He put a careful hand around her shoulders. She snuggled into it.

"We can head home in the morning," he promised.

She took a moment to process what he'd said before nodding into his chest. "Glad." She sighed. "Words are hard."

He laughed silently for just a moment. That hit a little too close to home. "They are."

* * *

 **A/N: Translation thanks to Google Translate. One more chapter to go!**


	9. Bruce

He wasn't entirely sure he would be able to stand.

It was a thought that was occurring on more and more mornings lately, particularly when he'd had punishingly cold dips in the harbor the night before and an unlucky hit to his bad knee besides. He'd made it to bed, at least - Alfred had insisted on it - but even with that comfort, he could already feel the grinding ache in his shoulder and the paralyzing pain in his knee. It felt stiff. Possibly immovably so.

He could just lay here, Bruce supposed. Until Alfred showed up, at least.

Something warm was pressed against his knee. A moment later, a matching warmth hit his shoulder. He let out a small groan as the ache began to ease.

A larger warmth scooted hesitantly closer. He opened his eyes to see Damian looking up at him anxiously. "Better, Father?"

The heating packs Damian had brought were already doing their work. He flexed his knee experimentally. Not quite ready to get up yet, but better. "Much." He carefully extended his arm, ignoring the pain, and pulled Damian closer. "You?"

 _"I_ was not injured. Unlike some."

"You were in the Cave," Bruce pointed out mildly. "You didn't have the same opportunities. Or any opportunities."

Damian shifted uneasily. "Yes."

Bruce closed his eyes and resisted the urge to groan again. "Damian."

"There may have been some minor . . . issues . . . with an experiment Drake and I ran. As I said, however, I am uninjured."

"And Tim?"

"Drake is also fine. Although I fear that we might have frightened Titus."

"Property damage?"

" . . . There should not be any in evidence."

"That's not a no." But he pulled Damian even closer anyway.

He could probably stand up now, but a little longer with the heat couldn't hurt. He had the time.

A little longer with Damian wouldn't hurt.

* * *

Heading down the stairs to the kitchen reminded him that his knee might be workable now but that didn't mean it had forgiven him quite yet. Damian's eyes kept flicking to him like he was expecting him to fall down the stairs.

He wasn't _that_ decrepit quite yet.

On weekends, they still had big breakfasts in the dining room, but more and more frequently on weekdays they just congregated in the kitchen. There was room for all of them, and it was a little less work for Alfred. Bruce wasn't the only one who was getting on in years.

Titus was curled up in a corner of the kitchen. Damian made a beeline for him once he was sure Bruce was out of danger. Alfred was hard at work at the stove, Tim at the coffeemaker. Jason and Cass probably weren't down yet.

Tim was pouring himself another mug of coffee. Judging by how much it looked like he'd already drunk, he might even be coherent by now.

Tim's eyes flicked over to him, as if guessing his thoughts. He held up the mostly empty pot. "Coffee?"

He should probably say no. But . . .

He looked at the frost clinging to the windows. The cold would do him no favors. Any ice out there would do him even less. And Tim had offered.

"Please."

Tim nodded and got to work.

Tim took his coffee black and and as strong as he could get it; Batman drank the same. Brucie Wayne drank sugary confections that helped people forget his age. Bruce - Bruce drank Tim's coffee. When he offered. Only when he offered it first.

Dark. Rich. A powerful flavor that totally overpowered any chemical undertones.

And a strangely powerful ward against whatever was paining him.

Tim was eerily good at noticing when Bruce was in pain, no matter how carefully he tried to hide it. Tim also knew, as all his children knew, that Bruce avoided medication whenever he could.

There were a thousand reasons. He didn't want to become dependent, as it would be so easy to do in their business. He didn't want Jason to have to see him take the pills, or worse, the shots. He didn't want to deal with the side effects or risk it interfering with something he needed more later.

He didn't want to admit that he needed them.

So Tim had become eerily good at making Bruce's coffee.

Bruce knew he was spiking it with something. He was pretty sure that Tim knew that Bruce knew. There was no need to make it awkward by bringing it up out loud.

He still wasn't entirely sure what Tim was spiking it _with_ \- wasn't even sure it was the same thing each time - but it let him get through the day a bit easier, and it hadn't had any adverse reactions to being mixed with caffeine yet.

And if Tim was mixing it, if Tim was the one to control when he got it, then it was as safe as he could make it.

"Here you go." Tim offered a steaming cup.

"Thank you, Tim." Bruce sipped it slowly, old habit still trying to figure out just what was hiding under the coffee beans' flavor.

His knee shuddered when he sat down for breakfast, and his arm ached when he reached for a plate.

By the time he stood up, neither did more than give a faint twinge.

* * *

Bruce rubbed his eyes. He'd let the Wayne Enterprises paperwork pile up more than he should, and he was paying for it now. It was only lunchtime, and his eyes were already strained from reading over the fine print on the seemingly endless documents on his desk.

It was possible, he admitted to himself, just possible, that he would get these headaches less frequently if he gave in and got reading glasses. He'd already bit the bullet and adjusted the cowl to compensate for his aging body's deficiencies. Surely that was sign enough he needed to.

But it was one thing to make increased magnification an option on the suit and another to start carrying a pair of glasses tucked in his pocket. Mainly a difference in what the tabloids would say, admittedly. And what his children would say.

And what the League would say.

He'd gotten them convinced he was practically inhuman. Well, all but Clark. The last thing he wanted to do was to shatter that image now. He wasn't fragile. Wasn't weak. He could still do his job.

It was just that it would be easier with reading glasses.

He sighed and blinked his eyes a few time in the futile hope that it would ward off the coming headache as he continued reading. The attempt was interrupted by the sound of his office door sliding open.

"Hiya, Pops."

Bruce looked up, already smiling. "Jason. What brings you here today? I thought you had class."

"We got let out early, so I had a huge break between that class and the next one. Thought I'd swing by and bring you some lunch." Jason set down a greasy paper bag on one of the few open spots on Bruce's desk.

Bruce gave the logo a hard look. "This is from that ridiculous restaurant, isn't it." It wasn't really a question.

"Bat Burger? Yes. Yes, it is. Look at it this way, Bruce, it's only a matter of time before one of the Rogues decides to mess with it. It's practically our public duty to stop by every now and then and make sure they're doing alright. Might as well taste-test the food while we're there to make sure it hasn't been poisoned."

"And you love their milkshakes."

"And I love their milkshakes," Jason confessed. "I was, uh, going to eat with you, but I got a bit peckish in the car, so . . . "

Bruce reached into the bag and pulled out a foil wrapped burger and a carton of fries. Jason'd had the sense not to get them jokerized. "You know better than to eat while driving."

"Bruce, this is Gotham's lunch hour. I might have eaten in an intersection, but that was because I was all but _parked_ in said intersection."

The burger smelled more enticing than he wanted to admit. "I won't tell Alfred if you won't."

Jason grinned. "Deal. So, what're you working on today? Tech proposals? Firing mad scientists in the making?"

Bruce groaned. "Budget proposals."

Jason winced. "Ouch. Tell you what, you eat, I'll read 'em out to you." He snagged a stack of papers before Bruce could respond.

Bruce knew from experience that Jason had a beautiful reading voice when he chose to use it. He didn't today, which was probably for the best - Jason's normal reading voice was melodic and soothing, something that might get positively soporific if combined with the dry reports. Instead, he animated the competing reports with imitations of his brothers and viciously snarked at any typos he found buried in them. Bruce caught himself laughing more than once.

When he was finally done with his burger, Jason glanced at his watch. "Gotta head out soon. I promised Alli I'd compare notes with her before the test."

"I've been hearing a lot about Alli recently."

Jason threw his hands up in the air. "You've been hearing a lot about Alli since you grabbed us from that alley, old man. Stop trying to read into it."

"Mm. You don't blush that red when you're going to meet Steve, though."

"Annnd, I'm outta here. See you later."

"Jason," Bruce called after him. "Thank you."

"Any time, Dad." Jason froze for a half-second as he realized what he'd said before bolting out the door.

Bruce let him go. There was a warmth in his chest that was worth even more than the fact that his burgeoning headache was gone.

* * *

He probably shouldn't drive, he reluctantly admitted to himself. He'd only just taken a seat in his car, and his shoulder was already protesting his hands' position on the wheel. Tim's . . . coffee . . . had long since worn off, and the headache Jason's visit had postponed was back with a vengeance. The car would be safe enough in the parking garage until someone could come by and pick it up. He could just get home through other means.

Except - Well, he was reluctant to call Alfred. No doubt Alfred would have some fiercely cutting things to say to the thought, but it was bitterly cold today. He didn't really want Alfred out and about in it.

He could call a taxi easily enough. Or one of the kids, if it wouldn't disrupt their schedule too much, but then he'd have to explain _why . . ._

He got out of the car and pulled out his cellphone, staring down at the screen in a rare moment of indecision.

A bright purple car screeched to a halt right behind his parking space. He didn't have to wait for the window to roll down to know whose it was.

"Get in, loser," Stephanie called cheerily. "We're going shopping."

Bruce's lips twitched as he locked his own car and slid into the front seat of hers. "Loser?"

Stephanie groaned. "Please tell me you've seen that movie. Wait, you know what? Don't say anything. Leave me that little shred of hope."

"So are we actually going shopping?"

"Yep. Christmas will be here soon, and for once, I am on top of this. I'm going to the great geek gathering place to get Tim that new game he's been wanting."

Bruce made a quick mental note to cancel that particular online order. "And what's my part of this shopping trip?"

 _"You_ are going to stand there and glare at anyone who looks like they're about to ask me condescending questions."

"I can do that."

* * *

"You know, you don't have to go out tonight."

Bruce paused in his stretches. "I'm not injured." Not recently injured, at any rate.

"And you're not heaving your guts up, so by your standards you're good to go," Dick said dryly. He swung himself up onto the balance beam and perched there like he was a bird instead of a thirty year old man. "I know you won't give up your sparring session with Cass, but are you really sure you're going to be up to - "

"I'm fine."

"Bruce, I have it on good authority from Clark that you said that literally two seconds before being sucked into the timestream. I'm not sure those words have actual meaning for you."

"And I came out of the timestream. And when I was, I was fine."

Dick buried his head in his hands.

Bruce hesitated. He hadn't meant to upset Dick. "I'll be careful?" he offered.

"That's what you said thirty minutes before being sucked into the timestream," Dick said into his hands.

Bruce walked over to him and rested a hand carefully on his arm. When Dick didn't jerk away, he let it settle there. "You seem unusually focused on that tonight."

Dick finally let his hands fall away. "Yeah, it's just . . . Look. You made a big deal out of there being a minimum age required for us to go out in the field. Do you ever think . . . "

"That maybe there should be a maximum one?" Bruce asked dryly.

Dick grinned ruefully. "Well. Something like that."

"I'm not quite out to pasture yet."

"No," Dick agreed, "but you can't keep doing this forever. Have you ever thought about what you'll do then?"

Bruce sighed. He'd been hoping to put this conversation off for a bit longer, but - Well. Here they were. He pulled himself up on the beam beside Dick. "Barring serious injury and with suit modifications, I think I can make it about another ten years. After that, someone else will have to take over the cowl. I'll stay back in the Cave and work more on the evidence side of things."

Dick nodded, but he still seemed on edge. "And who wears the cowl?"

Bruce's mouth twisted. "I don't know," he admitted. His least favorite words. "Damian wants it, but he'll have only been out on the streets for a few years. I don't think he'll be ready for it quite yet. You _don't_ want it if what you told me when I got back still holds true - "

"Very true."

" - and I want to honor that, even though you made me proud doing it."

"Thanks," Dick said quietly.

"So that leaves Barbara, Tim, Cass, and Jason."

"I don't see Barbara wanting it."

"I don't either. Which leaves the other three. Right now, Tim has no interest in leaving the Cave, but in ten years? And I'm sure Cass will be out by then, but I've got no idea what she wants to do with her life beyond that, which makes it hard to determine if the cowl would be a good fit."

"Jason could do it. He's got Gotham in his bones, he's a great fighter, and he's a whole lot smarter than he tries to get some people to think."

"He could," Bruce agreed. "Any of you _could._ I just don't know who I can ask to give up their own chosen path to do it."

"Maybe we could take it in turns," Dick said with a bright grin, nudging him. "I take it out one night, Jason gets it the next, Cass does it on weekends . . . Just think of all the really confused criminals we could leave in our wake."

Bruce's lips twitched.

"Well, we've got ten years to think about it," Dick conceded. "Just be careful until then." He dropped lightly onto the training mat before turning back to face Bruce with a grin. "Your grandkid will want a chance to see you in action."

"My _what?"_

* * *

Even patrol, brutal as it had been, hadn't been enough to destroy the warmth bubbling through him.

Dick was going to be a father.

He was going to be a grandfather.

No amount of happiness, though, could change the fact that by the time he reached his bed, he didn't so much as sit down on it as collapse onto it. If one of Ra's assassins managed to break in for his head, Bruce was going to have to fight him off without getting off the bed. There was no way he was moving until morning, and possibly not even then.

The helplessness of that crept through him uneasily, but there was nothing to be done about it now. He would be fine.

 _Fine._

A pair of eyes slowly appeared over the foot of his bed. Bruce tensed for an instant before recognizing them.

"Cass."

"Bruce." She pulled herself up onto the foot of the bed and perched in a crouch that would be easy to spring out of. "Rest now. I will watch."

"You don't have to do that."

She patted the bed firmly. "Rest."

Bruce sighed and slid under the covers. "You need rest too," he reminded her.

She nodded impatiently. "Just first watch."

He was already sliding off into sleep as he realized that meant that someone else had second. And possibly third and beyond. Which was sweet and paranoid and . . . well, his kids all over, really.

And he couldn't deny that his dreams felt safe.

* * *

He woke up to a small bundle of warmth cuddled into his chest that was probably Damian, and to Jason's long arm reaching over Damian to cling to Bruce's shirt. Judging by the breathing, Tim was the one nestled into his back, and Cassandra was still down at his feet but was now sprawled across the width of the bed, eyes peacefully closed.

Dick and Barbara had been here late enough that they'd stayed the night, and it was Dick who quietly pushed the door open and grinned at the sight before him. He was carrying a heavily overburdened tray.

"Morning, B," he whispered. "I had last watch, so I brought up breakfast. You doing okay?"

His back ached, and his knee still hurt, and the place he'd gotten nicked by a knife last night wasn't quite healed yet.

Tim let out a sleepy sigh and nuzzled closer into Bruce's back.

"Yeah," he whispered back to Dick with a smile. "I'm fine."


	10. Bonus Chapter: Mix and Mingle

**I don't own Batman.**

 **Title from "Jingle Bell Rock." This is the twelfth and final of my Christmas fics.**

* * *

Jason knew better than to open his eyes until he knew what was going on.

There had been a green light that had hit him hard in the chest. He'd fallen. And then . . .

A hazy memory of Batman showing up slowly surfaced.

He sighed in relief. That was okay, then. The restraints he could feel were probably some kind of precaution.

He opened his eyes. Yep. Batcave, padded medical restraints, and the man himself.

"Hey, Dad."

What? He was groggy, he was hurt, and it wasn't like he hadn't said it before. There was no need for Bruce to freeze up like that.

"Alfred? The blood work?" He sounded pretty tense.

Jason couldn't see Alfred from his position, but he could hear him just fine. "All clear, Master Bruce. And this is most definitely Master Jason."

"Was there ever any doubt?" Jason asked crankily. Then he thought of Bruce's weird expression again. "Oh, shoot. There was doubt. What'd that ray do to me? I'm not green or something, am I?" He looked down at his hands frantically, but he was still wearing his gloves. "My face is totally green right now, isn't it?"

"Your face is fine." Bruce's words were oddly clipped. "You have to admit that the costume is a departure from your usual, though."

Jason checked, just to be sure, but - "Bruce, I've been wearing this since you came back from being not-dead."

Bruce went stiff, then said in a tone that was oddly tentative, "Not exactly a lot of places to holster a gun."

Had Bruce gotten hit on the head or something? "Why would I be carrying a gun?"

Bruce's face looked pained for a split second before it went blank. "So that's what the light did. You're not our Jason."

It took him a moment to catch up. "I'm in another reality?" His head fell back against the pillow. "Bruce is going to freak out. Wait." He raised his head again. "You let your Jason carry a _gun?"_

Bruce's mouth twisted. "He didn't exactly ask my permission."

"So ground him from patrol! Threaten to cut off his college tuition!"

"I'm afraid we're a bit past that point, Master Jason." Alfred had finally come into view. He had more gray hairs than Jason remembered. His next comment was directed to Bruce. "The others should be back soon."

"Will that include alt-me, or did we switch places?"

"I'll have Oracle check," Bruce said. He hesitated. "Your alternate won't be here regardless."

"Oh." Jason slumped. He and B were seriously estranged then. That was depressing. "Can you let me out of here before you go? Now that we've established that I'm not a threat?"

Bruce and Alfred shared a look.

"Oh, come on. You can't _seriously think_ that there's any version of me that would attack you," Jason scoffed. "That's paranoid even for you, old . . . man . . . " His voice trailed off. "Your Jason's done that, hasn't he," he said flatly.

This universe stunk.

Before Bruce could leave, company rolled in. Dick, Damian, and Tim from the looks of it. He was kind of afraid to ask about the girls.

Wait a minute. Damian? Tim, he could see, but - Damian?

"Oracle said you had to take Hood back to the Cave," Dick said, striding forward. He was still Nightwing by the looks of it. "What happened?"

"It has left him in restraints," Damian noted. "Someone's in trouble."

 _"I'm_ in trouble?" he said incredulously. "I'm not the one got caught being on patrol about six years too early. What, did you that thing yourself and slip out your window?"

Everyone stared at him.

" . . . You let Damian patrol," he realized. "Why would you let the twelve year old patrol? Do you want him dead or something?"

In the awkward silence that followed, Bruce cleared his throat and said, "He's from an alternate reality."

"Ah,' Damian said stiffly. "Then I will forgive the insult, Todd, and inform you that in this reality, at least, I am perfectly trained for this."

Jason rolled his eyes. "And Dick was a professional acrobat, but that didn't mean Bruce let him out on patrol when he was nine."

There was an even more awkward silence. Jason stared at them all in disbelief. Bruce actually looked uncomfortable.

His head thunked into the pillow. "Okay. Hurry up and send me back. I hate this universe."

Tim actually laughed. "You're not the only one."

* * *

Jason twisted his helmet in his hands as he waited. The last few days here hadn't been horrible, but they had been _weird._ Nobody thought twice about putting their backs to him. Bruce had given him a hug in the middle of their discussion of how their realities differed. A _hug._

"Are you ready?" Bruce asked.

"Past ready." He shoved the helmet on. "Let's do this."

Bruce raised the reconstructed ray gun, but he hesitated over the trigger.

"Can't even handle a fake gun, old man?"

Bruce shook his head impatiently. "Jason, listen. I only know the bare bones of what happened between us in your world. I don't know if it can be fixed. I just want you to know that I . . . I can't imagine any version of me who doesn't love you. No matter what's happened.

Then, of course, he pulled the trigger.

Green light flashed around him.

Always had to have the last word, didn't he?

He came to in the Batcave. His Bruce was crouched next to him. The tiniest hint of tension in his shoulders loosened when Jason sat up.

And if the smallest piece of Jason wondered if Bruce might be right, well. That was nobody's business but his own.


End file.
